


Before the Precipice

by Anon_E_Miss



Series: Shattered [1]
Category: Transformers - All Media Types, Transformers AU - Fandom
Genre: AU, Canon-Typical Violence, M/M, Prowl fails as an orginator, Transformers AU, dub con, past Mech Preg, past dub-con
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-22
Updated: 2017-10-23
Packaged: 2018-05-22 14:11:55
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 26
Words: 132,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6082386
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Anon_E_Miss/pseuds/Anon_E_Miss
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The war is turning in the Decepticons' favour. With his informants whispering of growing danger, Jazz is forced to team up with Prowl, an Enforcer tactician determined to show the Autobots he might well hold the key to holding back the Decepticons.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> The muse is a flighty creature and this fic is coming to me in bits and pieces. Updates will come when they come. Unbeta'ed, I hope you enjoy.
> 
> I've a dictionary of terms used in this fic at the beginning of the first chapter.

By his nature, Prowl was not a vain mech. His finish was often dull or imperfect, depending on if an investigation was either full swing or stalling badly. The demands of his function would always came before the cosmetics of his frame. If confronted, Prowl would willingly admit, without shame, that the overall care of his frame fell low on his list of priorities. The Enforcers were his first priority, a reality that was not at all flattering when one considered his was the originator of two young mechs.

The Praxian Enforcer took another critical look at his reflection. Though he had considered completely replacing his colour-nanites, Prowl had opted instead to simply touch up the defects in his finish and then polish his plating to a low shine. He thought, as he looked at his reflection, that he looked like what he was, Praefectus Vigilum, chief of Praxus' Enforcers. His honours were written neatly on his doorwings, as they were with all Praxian Enforcers. They were the only ornament Prowl wore.

He was not insulted. It was both reasonable, and responsible to request that Prowl demonstrate the depths of his skill in strategy. After all, as Praefectus Vigilum, he had access of every records with the Enforcers' data banks, and he could easily have embellished his record. Beyond that, his tactical experience was strictly through casework with the Enforcers. Prowl had no formal military training. He was not insulted... He was, a touch, insulted.

Prowl bristled internally as he remembered the thinly veiled suggestion from one of the Autobot generals that he might have forged his records with the Enforcers, and perhaps even the degrees earned through his attendance at the Enforcer Academy. Even if his degrees were legitimate, the general had added, they had come from a Praxian school, and in any case, it was certainly no military college. The fact that Prowl had graduated with the highest marks ever achieved at the academy was really not impressive, neither was the fact that both his close rate, and his conviction were record breaking. Law enforcement was a completely different thing from the military, so these facts were meaningless. 

They expected him to fail, and it was this that Prowl found insulting. These generals thought he was a pampered dilettante from Praxus, with no experience outside of a pretty office. They willfully ignored the vorns of service Prowl had spent, first in investigations, than serving the Praxian Enforcer Tactical Unit.. They thought he had never held a blaster, or faced the threat of death. There was no denying that the dangers and duties of soldiers, and Enforcers were different, but it was enraging to have it suggested that Enforcers did not know true danger. 

These mechanisms judged their victories and defeats based on how many Cons they killed, rather then on how many of their own mechanisms they had lost. A victory that resulted in the loss of 70% of the fighting force while capturing a city was a hollow victory at best. How long could these victors hope hold the captured city when the Decepticons returned with fresh soldiers? A quartex, they had held the Tagon Heights a mere quartex post victory. The Decepticon reinforcements had arrived quickly, and the Auotobot reinforcements had delayed by sabotage and fighting with other Decepticon batallions.

Whether they knew it or not, the Autobots were losing the war.

A single ping announced a visitor, and Prowl silently signaled the door to open. His minor creation scampered in, doorwings flitting about without restraint. Bluestreak was nervous, and doing a poor job of disguising it, the originator noted with private fondness. He beckoned Bluestreak over, and lifted the holo-imitter that normally rested on his end table.

“Are you bringing that?” Bluestreak asked, gesturing at the holo-immiter that emitted a collection of image captures of his elder brother and himself.

“Yes,” Prowl replied, putting the device into his subspace. “I will need little else. Optimus Prime wishes to test me before he accepts my enlistment. Should he approve, we will concern ourselves with transporting the household to Iacon at that date." 

“I wish I could go with you,” the youngling said, longingly. “I don't understand why Vicomagister Ordo forbids it.”

“He is displeased that I have taken leave from the Enforcers to enlist with the Autobots in Iacon,” the originator explained. “It is rare for Praxians to leave our House. It reflects poorly on him that I would seek my future in service elsewhere.”

“Especially since Smokey's already gone,” Bluestreak said, nodding his helm and his doorwings in understanding. “Will you visit Smokey when you're there?”

“I have left him a message alerting him to my impending arrival,” Prowl replied. “If he sees fit to answer, I will see him.”

“Are you still angry with him?” The young Praxian's tone became somber as he asked.

“No,” the stoic Praxian assured his creation. “I remain disappointed in his previous actions, but the anger has passed. I hope he is doing well in Iacon.”

“You miss him,” Bluestreak said, faceplates quickly warming with a cheeky smile. He nudged his originator's doorwing with his own. 

“I do, as you do,” Prowl admitted. “I will give him your best if we meet. You will behave for the Vicomagister.”

Apart from the holo-immiter he had already packed, Prowl only needed to collect a box of dataslugs and a few blank datapads. Bluestreak hovered over his doorwings. Creation and procreator had been apart often in the past, really more than they had been together, given the nature of Prowl's work, but the distance had never been particularly great. Though the Enforcer had assisted investigations involving other city-states, he had always remained in Praxus. In fact, Prowl had never traveled beyond the capital at any time in his life.

“Of course,” the youngling replied. He fidgeted. Youglings his age were meant to have a stronger hold on themselves than he did. They were meant to be reserved, grown past the cheerful innocence of sparklinghood. Everything you said, every flick of your doorwing reflected upon your House, and you were meant to control every glyph, and every gesture, revealing only what you wanted to reveal. Bluestreak failed terribly at this. He wrapped his arms around his procreator, ignoring the subtle twitch of his originiators cheekplate. For a moment he said nothing, basking in the familiar steadiness of his originiator's EMF. Finally, he looked up, and asked: “You'll call me after you meet the Prime?”

“I will, and as often as I might for the duration of my stay,” the originator promised, tentatively patting the youngling's back. “I will not be gone so long, Bluestreak.”

***

The Transport Interchange was crowded with mechanisms, of both Praxian and foreign frametypes. Those native to Praxus kept a respectful distance from other mechanisms, but those ignorant of Praxian culture and manners, jostled and squeezed through the crowds, blind to the invisible barriers surrounding the locals. While other frametypes meshed EMFs, and brushed plating without a second thought, Praxians saved such contact close kin and lovers. He ignored the EMFs encroaching on his own, his expression neutral and his field quiet, even as a particularly irritated Towers frame, painted in a particularly garrish gold and blue colour scheme, collided with him.

Prowl knew the mech was looking for a fight before he even turned around. The mech's EMF boiled over with hostility and entitlement. Blue optics glared up at him, and the mech's well tuned engine snarled. A look of alarm flit over the mech's optics, and his engine sputtered. No doubt recognizing the Enforcer markings on Prowl's plating, he grimaced, whipped back around, and continued on his way. The fact that no apology was offered mattered little to Prowl.

From that point on, all other passengers, and staff kept a polite distance from Prowl. Praxians knew from the glyphs on his doorwings that he was not a mere Enforcer. Some went so far as to step from his path, others dipped their doorwings in a sign of respect. Those unfamiliar with the Praxian dialect were otherwise respectful, even wary, for the fact that he was an Enforcer alone. He flicked a doorwing in thanks to those who honoured him, a simple and subtle motion.

Realistically, he could have booked a private transport, but Prowl was neither ostentatious, nor lavish in his spending, and a commercial transport suited him fine. He arrived at the gate, and regretted his decision to book a commercial flight immediately. The gate was full of impatient, and frustrated travelers. Their flight had been delayed. Grimacing internally, Prowl elected to pass some of the joors at the oil house located within the terminal. Taking an empty stool at the bar, he ordered a quart of Engex sour. Prowl had no intention of getting overcharged, and kept his fuel intake moderation chip engaged. 

To his displeasure, when Prowl checked his data-net account he found no response from Smokescreen. It was hardly surprising, even if it did sting. There were times when the truth, especially when it came to emotions, was best left unspoken. It was a lesson Prowl was still struggling to learn. He rarely held his glossa, and in not doing so he had hurt his creation, and had likely irrevocably damaged their already poor relationship. Smokescreen had left Praxus believing Prowl thought him a disappointment.

Prowl brooded over his drink. He was a failure as a procreator. It was a bitter reality, and his greatest failing. A reasonable originator would have expressed his ire with gentler glyphs, but it had not even occurred to Prowl to speak more carefully, especially when he had been so angry. Whether he had meant them at the time or not, Prowl had come to regret those glyphs the instant his anger had faded, understanding how Smokescreen would have interpreted them. But Smokescreen had already gone, and his regrets had come far too late.

If he could convince the Prime, because Prowl gave little mind to the generals who had already dismissed him, then his life would be in Iacon. Perhaps, once they lived in the same city, he mind be able to mend his relationship with Smokescreen. Could Smokescreen anger at him have faded? The originator did not hold out a great deal of hope for this, given Smokescreen had inherited all of Prowl's own temper, and none of his restraint.

“Flight IA 334 to Iacon is ready to board. Passenger from our Prime section, Autobots, expectant originators, and procreators with sparklings please line up now.”

The drone voice announced Prowl's shuttle. While he was not ostentatious enough to book a private shuttle, he did like his space, and he had paid the obscene sum for a Prime seat. Still, he was in no hurry to join the throng that rushed the gate. He waited for an orderly line to form before joining it. Somewhere ahead of him, a sparkling, correction, a newling began to fuss. Prowl noted the grimaces of nearby passengers. It was never pleasant to be confined with an unhappy newling but haranguing the originator helped no one. It was easy enough to dial down one's audials. 

As Prowl made his way onto the shuttle, he suppressed a cringe at the piercing wail of the miserable newling. It was only a few short steps to his seat. He could have laughed at the absurdity of the situation as the passenger seated in front of him was none other than the garrish Towers mech from earlier in the cycle. The mech almost stopped himself from wincing, but he could not quite stop the reflex. Prowl pulled a datapad from his subspace, and began to read it, as though the gold mech was not even there. In a way it was a relief to be seated with him, this Towers mech was unlikely to attempt to engage Prowl in idle chatter.

The wailing of the newling increased in volume and Prowl looked up from his datapad to find he could see the newling's struggling originator though the open door between the shuttle's compartments. With a frown, the Praxian originator watched as the towering triple-changer seated next to the originator huffed and puffed. Over the cries of the newling, Prowl could not hear what the green and grey mech was saying but whatever it was it did little good to improve the triple-changer's disposition. He crowded the originator, taking more space that he was owed as the smaller mech tried to activate a feeding line. That was really quite enough.

Prowl rose and instructed a flight attendant designated to serve the Prime passengers to come with him. The flight attendant followed, a forced smile, and a cheerful EMF poorly disguising his unease. This mech knew who Prowl was and hesitated to do anything that might displease him. They made their way to the seats of the originator and the triple-changer. 

Exhaustion, exacerbation, and desperation clashed with impatience, irritation and disdain. Standing next to them, Prowl saw both the Autobot insignia emblazoned on the originator's chassis, and the odd fact that the newling he held was a flyer. The exacerbation in the originator's field flared at the sight of Prowl, the impatience in the triple-changer's morphed into pleasure. This latter fact displeased Prowl greatly.

“He may have my seat,” Prowl said, gesturing to the originator.

“Pardon? Sir?” The flight attendant sputtered.

“He may have my seat,” the Enforcer repeated, and looking to the originator said: “it will be easier for you to feed him in a more comfortable space.”

“Are you sure?” The mech asked. He was a servus frame, a frametype with its origins in the Crystal City. His frametype had served Towers of Crystal City for thousands of vorns. 

“I am,” Prowl said, he stepped aside so the originator could stand and he gave the flight attendant a steady look. “You will afford him the comforts you would have afforded me.”

“Yes, Praefectus Vigilum, I certainly will,” the attendant replied. “Follow me to your new seat, sir.”

Both the originator, and the triple-changer gave Prowl a look of incredulity. The originator stood, still trying to hush his unhappy mechling, before following the flight attendant, he offered Prowl a neat bow.

“Thank you, Sir,” he said. Prowl dipped his doorwings, and with a tired but genuine smile, the originator left.

With the originator gone, the triple-changer could only stare nervously at Prowl. The disgusted Enforcer gave him a long look and watched him squirm. There was nothing in his field or his face to give this mech any signal of his emotions which only fed the bully's anxiety. Only when his temper had eased did Prowl speak.

“You will keep all of your parts within your own seat, are we clear?”

End Chapter 1. 

Edited 2016-07-04. 

Dictionary:

ATS: Advanced Tactical Systems  
To Bud: to conceive, receptive term  
To Carry: to be pregnant  
Creation: offspring  
Emergence: birth  
Femme: spark frametype that is always contributive  
Institute: psychiatric hospital To Kindle: to conceive in another, contributive term Mech: spark frametype that may be receptive or contributive  
Mechanism: Cybertronian, person  
Newling: baby  
Newspark: newling in the gestation tank/womb  
Originator: carrier, mother, receptive spark  
PETU: Praxian Enforcer Tactical Unit  
Procreator: creator, parent  
Progenitor: sire, father, contributive spark  
Separation: when a new spark breaks from the originating spark to descend into the developing frame  
Sparkling: child  
Youngling: youth


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Prowl doesn't exactly make a great first impression on the Autobots. But then, they don't make a great first impression on him.

The triple-changer did keep his parts to himself, as best as a mech his size could, in any case. A reasonable mech of his stature would have booked a Titan seat, the cost was not considerably greater than the Iacon seat he had crammed himself into, and the space was considerably more generous. This mech, however had pinched his credits and had booked a seat he simply did not fit. Prowl tucked his doorwings down, as tight to his frame as he could, still the mech's pauldron repeatedly scraped against edge of his doorwing. Each scratch sent a short prick of pain over the Praxian's sensory net, even after he dialled down his doorwings' sensitivity. It was precisely this sort of scenario Prowl had hoped to avoid by booking a Prime seat.

He was not amused, in fact he was downright irritated. Nonetheless, Prowl did not regret his decision. It had only been a matter of klik before the newling's cries had quieted, and the mechling had not made another sound since. Originators held a place of honour in Praxus and no Praxian of any house would have shame himself by harassing one. 

Unlike most other frametypes, Praxian were matriarchal, and followed the receptive spark line. The Vicomagister of the tactician's own House was a great, great uncle to Prowl's originator. In fact Vicomagister had cemented his place in their family by budding three times. Each carrying had resulted in a healthy mech, and each in turn had produced two or three more Praxian mechlings. It went on and on from there. Windbreaker's descendents were all mature mechanism making their marks in Praxus, and their ziggurats littered the Ordo compound. Soon they would be pleading for the right to create. Prowl's procreators, descended from one of Windbreaker's brothers, had abandoned the compound, and the ziggurat they had built before his budding, and had long since made their home in a small community the edges of the Praxian state. They had exiled themselves from their House when their sole creation had been only a mechling. Prowl had been behind.

He hated the shame he still felt at his abandonment, and hated even more the reality that he had more or less done the same thing to Smokescreen. In truth, his relationship with Bluestreak relied far too much on the youngling easym and patient nature, rather than any improvement in Prowl's procreating skills. 

It did not matter how tall Prowl built his ziggurat, the stain of his abandonment and his own imperfections would always remain. He could have built the tallest and grandest ziggurat, dwarfing those of his cousins, in an attempt to compensate for his flaw, but Prowl had seen no point. There would always be a glitch in his processor, and so he would always be perceived a less than Windbreaker's descendents. Building a tacky ziggurat could not change that. Prowl had added to his modest ziggurat upon his appointment to Praefectus Vigilum, but only enough as to not insult his office. The only truly luxurious detail to his home was the garden, some of whose crystals he had seeded with his own servos. When the Autobots accepted his enlistment, and they would unless they were total fools, he would bring a small number of those crystal to Iacon to grow a new garden. 

The shuttle dipped sharply, and Prowl clenched his denta to stop himself from cursing as the turbulent rocking of the shuttle tossed his seat mate against him. A sharp elbow dug into his left doorwing, denting the thin plating. After all the care Prowl had put into his finish the bulky slagger had undone his work without so much as hint of apology. 

Out of spite, Prowl waited to rise and to disembark until the bulk of their cabin had exited. The triple-changer did not dare breath a glyph of complaint or impatience, though his EMF communicated both clearly enough. The Praxian ignored him, giving the mech no hint that he was doing this to out of a petulant need for some token revenge. Gathering his thoughts, and his patience, Prowl took the time to watch the other passengers walk down the aisle and off the shuttle. Finally, when only a few passengers remained, he rose. As he exited the shuttle, Prowl promised himself that for his return flight to Praxus, he would book a private shuttle.

“Sir?” Prowl stopped and turned at the greeting. It was the originator from before. The green and grey mech, though visibly tired, smiled brightly at Prowl. One servo rested over his recharging newling. A single, tiny wing-nub twitched as the mechling fluxed. “Thank you, again for your kindness.”

“I did only what was proper,” Prowl replied. A lifetime of practice kept the Praxian from shifting from ped to ped with the awkwardness he felt under such obvious admiration.

“In the two mega-cycles we've been travelling, not one mechanism went out of their way to help us,” the originator said. “I'm grateful that you cared enough to help.”

“You are welcome,” the Enforcer replied, He did not linger, taking his leave of the originator as soon as it was polite of him to do so. Where had this mech and his newling come from? Prowl wondered. Vos perhaps, it was home to the Seekers, and all other flight-frames. However, it was odd that the mech would be alone. Seekers and their kin were mad for creations. They were especially infamous for guarding their creations, and their mates like rare jewels, rarely letting them out of the safety of their aeries. His battle computer hummed at the back his processor, toying with this question. 

The delay of the flight had cost Prowl precious time, and he no longer had the luxury of stopping at his hotel room before heading to the Palace of the Prime. He scowled at the imperfections on his doorwing, there was no time to correct the stinging dent or to buff the scrapes but the Praefectus Vigilum stole a moment to take a polishing cloth to the paint transfers.

Despite the delays, and the hideously slow traffic, Prowl arrived at the Palace ahead of schedule. Belatedly, he realized that by not stopping at his hotel suite, he remained in possession of his personal weapon. It was a considerable oversight. Annoyed by his own carelessness, the Praxian drove through the first check-point. To his surprise, the palace grounds that had been famous during the Golden Age for their beauty, had morphed into a military base. Apart from the palace itself, which remained unchanged, it was unrecognizable from the images Prowl had seen in dataslugs. As he drove through each successive check-point, the tactician found himself waved through on sight. Not one guard or soldier asked to search Prowl's subspace, or even for identification. It was a lapse of security Prowl strongly disapproved of. He transformed at the steps of the palace itself and was intercepted by a waiting guard.

“Praefectus Vigilum, you are expected,” he greeted Prowl with a salute.

“Your security is lacking,” Prowl said in a cool reply. The Primal Vanguard dimmed, and re-lit his optics in surprise.

“Sir?” He asked, with obvious befuddlement.

“I have passed through four checkpoints, and at no point has my frame, or my subspace been scanned for active or inactive weapons,” the Enforcer informed him. “Is it customary for Neutral mechanisms to enter the Prime palace with a loaded rifle?”

“No, sir,” the guard replied, stiltedly.

“Then you will take this,” Prowl ordered as he withdrew his rifle from his subspace. “I will reclaim it when I leave.”

“Uh, yes sir,” the flustered mech agreed as he took the weapon, and deposited it in his own subspace. “An acid pellet rifle, sir?”

“It is equally effective on mechanisms and constructs,” the Praxian explained. “A non fatal hit will disable a target in a matter of a klik as the acid burns through circuitry.”

“Interesting,” the guard said. His EMF hummed with intrigue and nerves. Though the Vanguard seemed to want to ask Prowl more questions, nervousness overruled curiosity, and he led Prowl up the steps, and through the palace doors without any other questions. Outwardly unaffected, but internally quite morose, Prowl followed. In his chassis, his spark twinged as his ATS's predictions for the future of the war only became more grim.

***

Jazz stood in the far back of the Operations room. Though normally reserved for the tactical team, and officers, this mega-cycle it was crowded with looky-loos. The Praxian Enforcer would be arriving at any klik, set to show them what a real strategist could do. This Prowl had laid out a long list of complaints and failings regarding Autobot operations in the last ten vorns, rubbing the commanders the wrong way before he had even arrived. On one servo Jazz wanted to laugh at the absurdity of the idea that an Enforcer knew better how to wage war than the Autobot generals. On the other servo, Jazz had his doubts that the Golden age generals actually did know what they were doing in this modern war.

He quirked a brow ridge as one of his new...ish operatives slipped up beside him. Jazz had recruited Smokescreen from the Academy of Science and Technology where the Praxian had been attending classes and running a little gambling ring on the side. In the short time Smokescreen had resided in Iacon, and before Jazz had taken notice, the young mech had made vast connections amongst both underbelly of the city, and the upper echelon. The psyche student had a whole host of sources separate from Jazz's own, a fact the saboteur was happy to use to his advantage. Smokescreen had become a sort of protege to Jazz. His processor was quick and devious; though, his discipline was a bit lacking.

“Didn't think you'd have much interest in this circus,” Jazz spoke through his internal comm.

“Show's what you know,” Smokescreen replied in the same manner. Though there was a teasing edge to his mental voice, it came across as forced. Their conversation stalled as they watched as the doors opened, and Optimus Prime entered, followed by a dour monochrome Praxian. Smokescreen crossed his arms, and nodded his helm at the other Praxian. “That would be my originator.”

“Sorry, what?” The Polyhexian asked. He turned his helm to stare at his subordinate, barely computing what he had heard. “Your originator is Praefectus Vigilum of Praxus?”

“Yep,” the red and blue Praxian confirmed. “He's my origin.”

“You don't look a thing like'm,” Jazz replied. Except, at second glance, Jazz could see a subtle resemblance. Their facial structures were similar, and both had crests with chevrons adorning their helms. Smokescreen might have been a little less well armoured but apart from that, the strongest different between them was their paint jobs. The bright blue and red of his subordinate's plating stood in stark contrast to his originator.

Greater than the cosmetic differences where their demeanors. Even across the room, Jazz could plainly see that Prowl carried himself with a military baring. He was stiff, and formal, and completely expressionless. Smokescreen, meanwhile preferred a loose limb-ed, and relax posture. The younger Praxian was always animated, speaking with not only his doorwings, and vocalizer, but also his servos.

He was a rule breaker, defiant of authority, almost on principle. Jazz got the idea that this quirk was in direct response to his rigid procreator. Smokescreen was not really disrespectful, but he was choosy over who he respected, and what exactly he thought was worthy of respect. That attitude had put him at odds with more than a few of the officers. A few would happily discharge that colourful Praxian for insubordination, but as a member of Special Ops, Smokescreen fell solely under Jazz's authority. Ops mechs were a different breed, and defiance was hardly the oddest quirk any of his mechanisms possessed.

Smokescreen had been honest about his record in Praxus, but the criminal charges, and sentence of detention painted a starker picture of the young Praxian's family life now. He had also hinted at some sort of estrangement from his family. To have a youngling with a criminal record would have been embarrassing enough to the average procreator, but to the Praefectus Vigilum it would have been particularly humiliating.

“Is he as good as he thinks he is,” Jazz asked as he watched his subordinate's profile. The Praxian was keeping his field tight to his frame but Jazz was still able to detect the emotional turmoil within it.

“Maybe better,” Smokescreen said, looking ahead to watch his procreator speak to the Prime, and generals in low tones. “He's a total aft, but he's brilliant. Absolutely, fragging brilliant.”

“This ain't the Enforcers,” the saboteur noted. “It ain't Praxus neither.”

“He'll input data, and the objective into his battle computer, and it'll cough up miracles,” his subordinate replied with begrudging pride. “Maybe not miracles, but it sure seems that way. I got in some slag once, and an Enforcer dragged me down into Enforcer Command. Originator was standing in this ring, they called it the Hub. He was surrounded by holo-imagers and projections. They were executing some sort of raid on a warehouse. Originator commanded the whole thing, catching everything on those screens, and ordering the Enforcers here and there. Those Enforcers weren't in Praxus, most of them weren't even Praxian. They were Seekers, in Vos.”

The colourful Praxian crossed his arms fighteri over his chassis and his doorwings waved about erratically as he scowled at his originator. Hurt oozed from Smokescreen's field. Jazz enveloped the younger mech with his own, and offered him unwavering support, and reassurance as Smokescreen continued.

“He didn't acknowledge me until there was a lull. When the screens went blank, he turned around, and ordered me to wait in his office until he was finished. The Enforcer that had arrested me marched me off, and stood guard as I waited... I waited for three joors before my originator bothered to turned up.”

“Chewed you aft off?” Jazz asked, offering the Praxian a comforting pat.

“No,” Smokescreen grumbled. “Origin doesn't yell... I mean ever. He barely even raises his voice. He's always... flat. I would scream and fight just to get him to react, but nothing's ever changed. When I made him angriest, he was just cold.”

“Praefectus Vigilum Prowl has been gracious enough to agree to a demonstration his skills through a tactical simulation,” the Prime spoke, silencing all other conversations, and drawing Jazz's attention away from Smokescreen. His subordinate's originator sat across the tactical station from a red and white officer from Tyger Pax. “Commander Countdown has volunteered to spar with him. Prowl, you will act as the Autobots. Countdown, you with act as the Decepticons. The scenario is set, please begin.”

Jazz inched closer, sliding through the crowd. Smokescreen had lit a spark of curiosity in his processor, and the Special Ops mech needed to see for himself if Prowl lived up to his creation's tale. Even estranged from his originator, Smokescreen still seemed to admire him. That younglinghood experience might have given the red and blue Praxian an exaggerated idea of his procreator's abilities. But there was a chance, a really good chance that Smokescreen was spot on. If Prowl was as good as his creation thought he was, then the odds just might have tipped in the 'Bots favour.

Countdown plugged into the tactical hub, and immediately begun utilizing it's simulators to plot out an attack. He flipped feverishly through the screens projected in front of him, his EM field flared with determination, and pride. He was confident that he could beat the upstart Praxian. Prowl's field, on the other servo was still and quiet, empty of any hints of what might be going through the Enforcer's processor. It was not pulled tight to his frame either, it was just blank. He flicked through the windows on his side of the hub, at an efficient and steady rate. Periodically, Countdown looked up to smile or smirk at his colleagues, there cheering him on. Across from him, Prowl never looked up from his display. Stranger still, the Praxian had yet to connect to the hub.

The scenario was set in Nova Cronum, and in this setting the Autobot's were barely holding on to the city-state. They principle base, in central Nova Cronum, was under siege by a much larger Decepticon force, with their Autobot allies a ways off in Tyger Pax. Nova Cronum was suffering an energon shortage, and the population within the base and in the city-state's centre were frantic. Jazz had a good idea what Countdown was going to do to break the city. What Jazz was impatient to see was what Prowl was going to do to counter him.

Jazz had seen this scenario before except that it had been all far too real. He found Optimus' optics across the room, and frowned. Was this on purpose? Did the Prime also want to know if different decisions might have saved Uraya? Even thirty stellar-cycles on, the loss of that base, and all of those Autobots still smarted.

Countdown moved first. His Decepticon besiegers launched a fresh attack on Nova Cronum. Prowl's Autobots barely held the city, and suffered significant losses in the process. So much like Uraya, their remaining energon plant was damaged. Facing the nightmare of starvation, Nova Cronum did not surrender. Jazz cocked his helm as he watched. The Praxian immediately surprised him by making no move to reinforce the Autobot defenders. He could not see where Prowl was moving his troops. It appeared as though they remained in Tyger Pax but Jazz suspected this was a ruse. Countdown marched his own reinforcements north to the Manganese Mountains.

Just what was Prowl doing with his reinforcements? Gasps, and startled curses erupted from behind Jazz as the answer came. Prowl's forces seemed to appear from the ether, surpising the Decepticon reinforcements as they recharged in their camp. Caught with his plating loose, and his forces trapped in the treacherous terrain of the Manganese Mountains, Countdown's reinforcements were wiped out. The guerilla attack had been executed to perfection. It was only a matter of a few simulated mega-cycles and Prowl had his Autobots surrounding the Decepticon's at Nova Cronum, and Countdown had no choice but to surrender.

“You'd let them starve,” Countdown accused, looking across the tactical station with condemnation in his optics. Prowl looked singularly unmoved as he replied:

“I calculated a 56.42% chance, at best, that a direct assault on the Decepticons at Nova Cronum would result in the relief of the besiege city at the cost of 61.89% of the Autobot reinforcements. With the depleted force, and the burden of numerous casualties, it would not be possible to prevent the retreating Decepticons from regrouping with the reinforcements. Upon their inevitable return to Nova Cronum, I calculated an 89.33% chance of the capture of the Twin City by Decepticon forces, and the total annihilation of the Autobot defenders.”

It was just like Uraya...

“You can't know that,” the Autobot commander countered, plating flared and a sneer of disgust on his faceplates. 

At this, Prowl plugged in to the hub, and downloaded a series of simulations into the holo-imager, and immediately set them to play. The siege of Nova Cronum played out again and again with the Autobots only achieving victory a scarce handful of times. Jazz frowned at the imager.

“'N how did you put all those sims together without usin' the sim?” Jazz asked, he made optic contact with Optimus, and cocked his helm at his leader.

“My ATS contains a rudimentary simulator,” Prowl replied.

“ATS?” Countdown asked, barely controlling his temper.

“Advanced Tactical Systems,” the Enforcer replied. “A set of systems similar to this station, condensed down to the form of a battle computer and logic processor.”

“That's insane,” the commander exclaimed. “No central processor is meant to handle that kind of data load.”

“My systems are unique to me,” Prowl replied, as still and unmoved as before. The dumbfounded, and disturbed stares of two dozen mechanism did not seem to faze him. “To my knowledge such an upgrade has never been successfully performed on another sentient mechanism.”

“There must have been consequences to this modification,” the Prime said, quieting the whispers. His voice was more concerned than curious to Jazz's sensitive audial horns.”

“They are manageable,” the Praxian replied. “I have maintained these systems for vorns”

“I want to test these systems again,” Countdown demanded, losing his hold on his anger. Embarrassment flare through his field and he caught himself. Sheepishly, he looked to Optimus. “If I may, sir.”

“Prowl, do you have any objections?” Optimus asked.

“No, sir,” Prowl replied. “Perhaps I should act as the Decepticons this time?”

It did not matter that Countdown had switched to the familiarity of the Autobot army, in the end he failed. He stared, befuddled at the projection as Prowl's Decepticon forces plundered Simfur before razing it. It took Prowl's Decepticons less than an orn to take not only the Autobot bases in the city-state, but to take the capital as well. With the city-state in ashes, the simulated Lord himself surrendered.

“How could you know where my camp was?” the commander asked.

“There is a double agent in your regiment,” the Enforcer replied. “Your security, both of your battle plans, and of your bases were lacking. The same can be said for here.”

“Prowl?” The Prime asked. He frowned at the Praxian; Jazz knew the look. Prowl had overstepped.

“At no point since I arrived at your Palace, have I been searched for weapons,” Prowl revealed, staring the Prime dead in the optic as he chastised him. The angry grumble of the commanders did not quiet him. “Respect for visiting dignitaries or Neutral officers should not be held above your security, Prime. I hope, in any case, that it was respect for my office, and not habitual laziness that allowed me to pass through every checkpoint without my presence questioned. You do not know me, Sir. I could have been an assassin, and had I been, I would have stepped into your private chambers with a loaded acid pellet rifle.”

Jazz took a single step towards Prowl, visor glowing bright. Before he lunged to restrain the Praxian Enforcer, he glanced back for Smokescreen only to find the young Praxian had already gone. Good, Smokescreen did not need to see this. When he turned his helm back, he found his subordinate's originator looking directly at his visor, totally unperturbed.

“I do not actually have it,” Prowl said, he shifted a doorwing in the direction of the guard still standing at the door. His optics never wavered from Jazz. “I gave it to him.”

“He did... s...s...sir,” the guard stammered.

“With one well place assassin, you would be lost, Prime,” the Praxian tactician warned, shifting to face Optimus as Jazz relaxed. “Without you, the Autobots would fall within the vorn.”

“The Autobot cause would outlive me,” the Prime argued. In contrast to the confidence of his words, the officers and the audience around them murmured anxiously to each other.

“No,” Prowl countered. He looked over the shell shocked crowd. “They would not.”

End Chapter 2.

Edited 2016-07-04. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jazz questions if the Autobots will ever learn and Prowl fears he's processor glitch just might frag everything up as usual.
> 
> Extra notey note. The next update might be delayed. I've finished day two of six and I've been too stupid with exhaustion to write anything worth publishing. Depending on how the next few days go, I may not get any really writing done until the end of next week.

The Enforcer's glyphs echoed in Jazz's helm. Images of assassins in the guises of Enforcers, senators and lords flashed across his HUD. He had thought that the mega-cycles of lacks security had passed. Soundwave's deception had nearly brought the Autobots to their knees. It had shatter the Special Ops, with few assets from that time still remaining amongst the living. Jazz had worked tirelessly to rebuild the unit after his mentor's demise at his friend's servos. If Soundwave had waited, if the Decepticon spymaster had worked his way into Optimus' inner circle...

After the Cassette-carrier's true allegiances had been discovered, Jazz had taken it upon himself to vet every operative, every Primal Vanguard, every general. The weakness that Soundwave had revealed in the Autobot defences had been plugged. Except Prowl had been allowed within arm's length of the Prime with a rifle. The question would need to answer how, was whether the Praefectus Vigilum had just been a special case or if the Vanguard had become really than ambivalent.

He was not the only mech broading, either. Jazz leaned against the window of the Prime's personal office. The generals had been dismissed, as had Prowl and Optimus and Jazz had slipped away to discuss the joor's events. Though the generals had no use for Jazz and his ops, what begrudging respect Punch had held had not passed down to his successor.

“He's right you know,” the Polihexian said after a time. “'N if it's obvious to a fraggin' Neutral Enforcer, what do ya want to bet the 'Cons know it to?”

“I would prefer to believe otherwise...,” Optimus sighed. The seed of doubt had been planted. He ran two digits over his olfactory ridge. “The Autobots are more than just me.”

“Ya, but you're our spark,” Jazz replied. “Not just any mech could fill your ped-steps.”

“You're thinking of my predecessor,” the Prime said. 

“Sentinel got us into this mess,” the Polihexian replied. Jazz pushed himself away from the wall and started to pace. “He all he needed to do wasnegotiate with the rebels, listen to what they had to say. He road right on over them instead, thinkin' they were just glitch mice he could run off or crush. 'Cept that didn't work 'n his ruthlessness just played right into Megatron's servos.”

“I don't remember the vorns of my predecessor,” Optmius revealed. He met Jazz's surprised optics, one of the only mechanism capable seeing through his visor and through him. “I don't know Orion Pax, even though I was him. I know that I laboured. I sometimes wonder if the Decepticon cause might have spoken to me, even if Megatron's methods did not.”

“Maybe that's why the Matrix chose you,” Jazz theorized. The Polihexian turned to the window and looked out at the training yards. “Because you can see the difference.”

“I don't know if I would have let him abandon Uraya,” the Prime said, thinking out loud, not of the actual simulation but of the base they had lost. “It would never have occurred to me to do so.”

“That's why we need him, Big Bot,” the saboteur replied. “He can take those ugly decisions 'n make some good of it.”

***

Prowl was fully aware that he had offended the Prime's core officers. He had long had a habit of offending politicians and prominent citizens, and Prowl felt no shame in admitting that it was a habit he had put little effort into breaking. The Enforcer had hesitated for only a nanoklik before he had admonished the gathered Autobots, the Prime included, for the fatal and obvious flaws he had witnessed. The truth, the reality as Prowl saw it at least, need to be spoken, and the wounded egos of those officers simply could not be allowed to matter.

They would resist his enlistment, perhaps more now that they would have before. The fact that they now wanted the tactician to prove he could survive in a battle only told him that they were grasping at straws. Prowl found himself thinking back to his first firefight with a frown. It had not been his finest moment.

He had knew how to shoot, of course. House Ordo counted many militia-mech as their members. Prowl's own procreators had been members of the Praxian Militia. As far as Prowl was aware, they still were. Though they had not been present to teach him, caretakers had taught the Enforcer to shoot on the family's personal gun range when he had been a youngling, one of the few House traditions he had been allowed to enjoy. Hunting was considered the most respectable of pastimes for affluent mechanisms, and Prowl's education would not have been considered complete until he had mastered a firearm. Enforcer training had only broadened his repertoire. Neither the gun range at the Ordo compound or the training sims had prepared him for a real ambush. 

Simulations were no replacement for true experience. An ambush your trainer had warned you to prepare for simply could not prepare you for an actual ambush. Prowl had come out alive, in fact he had come out of the attack without a dent, his partner and the suspect had not. Now, it had been vorns since Prowl had actually actively participate at ground level on an operation. When he had moved to PETU from metaforensics, Prowl had settled into the role of tactical officer, and had never again set ped at a crime scene. From th enon he had operated from the HUB, planning and executing operations from Enforcer Command, rarely even interacting with the other PETU members beyond the unit's commanders.

Smokescreen had ambushed him. It had taken all of Prowl's considerable will to stop himself from chasing after his creation. There had been no missing that insignia, even from across the room, and he could not say how he felt knowing Smokescreen had joined the Autobots. There was a little pride, how could he not be proud? But there was also a very real fear that Smokescreen's latent recklessness might see him killed.

He would have liked to have known. Prowl sighed. They were no more than strangers, really. Maybe worse than strangers, for all Prowl loved Smokescreen he often did not like him, or at least what he did. There were pleasant memories, but most were overshadowed by disappointment and fear. And what did Smokescreen feel..? Looking back had the happy memories, could Prowl really say that his elder creation had enjoyed himself? Of course he had tried to communicate with Smokescreen, tried to understand his creationm and tried to get his creation to understand but most of their interactions by the end of Smokescreen's younglinghood had ended in the young mech screaming and Prowl walking away. The time for bonding between originator and creation was the newling vorns, and the elder Praxian had been incapable of it. That failure had haunted him throughout Smokescreen's formative vorns.

A ping in his HUD brought Prowl out of his ruminations. His spark clenched as he opened his comm to that familiar ID.

“Where are you staying?” Smokescreen asked. Over the comm, Smokescreen's exact mood could not be easily discerned. Prowl doubted that his creation was precisely thrilled to be contacting him. 

“Hello Smokescreen,” Prowl replied, digits curling over the edge of a table as he worked to steady his racing spark. “I have a suite at the Deversorii Solus.”

“I'll be there in half a joor,” the younger Praxian announced. He left his originator no chance to reply as the comm clicked out.

The thought of meeting with Smokescreen filled Prowl with a mixture of anticipation and dread. He had missed his creation over the stellar-cycles he had been living in Iacon. His feeble attempts to reach out had all gone unanswered. Was Smokescreen still attending the Academy? There were so many questions circling in his processor, and Prowl was already afraid to voice any of them. How could he show his interest in Smokescreen's life without it coming off as an interrogation? Alone in his hotel room, the faint downturn quirk to his lipplates went unseen. Had Prowl had company, most mechanisms would not have noticed his frown.

Precisely three bream later, a ping at Prowl's door alerted him to Smokescreen's arrival. Either his creation had been nearby or he had sped. The Enforcer that he was disapproved of the implication but Prowl crushed the thought-train before it gathered steam. By the Guiding Hand, he was going to have a civil conversation with his creation. 

“Come in Smokescreen,” Prowl instructed as he sent the door the command to open. 

Smokecreen looked much the same, to Prowl's optics. Apart from the Autobot insignia that had replaced the House glyph at the centre of his chassis, his creation had not physically changed. He still stood with a casual slouch, his doorwings flitting about idly on his back.

“You didn't bring Blue?” Smokescreen asked after he looked the central room over. He looked deeply disappointed.

“Vicomagister required he remain in Praxus for the time being,” Prowl explained. It did not hurt to know that Smokescreen had come hoping to see Bluestreak. He had always been pleased to know his creations were close. Bluestreak had come to be their only even ground.

“He's your creation,” the red and blue Praxian said with a flare of irritation and impatience in his EMF. “Why do you listen to the Windbreaker?”

“He is the Vicomagister of my House,” the elder Praxian reminded his creation. “Antagonizing him is not practical. I do not intend to leave Bluestreak in Praxus for long. Should the Prime accept my enlistment, I will bring Bluestreak here.”

“Hmf,” Smokescreen huffed. The young Praxian plopped himself down on the couch at the centre of the suite, and crossed his arms. “They aren't going to listen to you just because you tell them to. They aren't your Enforcers.”

“They are not,” Prowl agreed. “I leave it to the Prime to command his soldiers.”

“He's a good mech,” his creation declared, flaring his doorwings with a burst of confidence. He met Prowl's optics in a challenge. “He's a good leader.

“Good leaders are not always good strategists,” the originator replied.

“Some are,” Smokescreen countered. He did not reveal what leader he was thinking of. “You'll really leave the Enforcer behind for the Autobots?”

“Praxus is not an island,” Prowl said. “If Megatron is successful, our home faces the same doom as the whole of Cybertron.”

***

The guards made a point of checking Prowl for weapons at each checkpoint as he returned to the palace early the next light-cycle. Based on the tension and displeasure poorly concealed in their EM fields, Prowl suspected this was being done in part to irritate him. They failed there. Prowl was pleased with the heightened security, even if it was borderline intrusive. He had suspected this might occur. The Primal Vanguard had obviously been embarrassed by his revelations. Had an officer previosuly instructed them to show him deference, that ordered had been rescinded. 

At each checkpoint Prowl had his ID scanned and his subspace checked. Prowl had elected to leave his personal weapons at the hotel so the guards had no excuse to delay him overlong. Waiting for him at the Palace steps was the same guard as he had the previous mega-cycle. This was not expressly surprising to Prowl. What did come as a surprise was the broad smile on the Vanguard's faceplates as he approached.

“Prowl, Sir,” the guard greeted. “You were really impressive last cycle. I think I've ever seen anything like it.”

“Thank you, Soldier,” Prowl replied. He paused for a klik. “What is your designation?”

“Lockstock, Sir,” the younger mech said, perhaps smiling even more widely. “Did you bring your rifle to use at the range?”

“I elected to leave it at my hotel, “ he Enforcer explained. “I have no doubt the range has suitable weapons available.”

“Nothing quite like your rifle.” Lockstock replied with an air of disappointed. He chuckled after a moment. “But one thing we aren't short of around here is guns.”

Given the lack of security he had experienced at the base that statement left Prowl feeling dubious. All he could do was hope that they were properly stored, ideally behind a particularly secure lock. Lockstock led Prowl through the palace grounds, now army base. He was enthusiastic as he took Prowl on an unofficial tour on their way to the armoury and gun range. Though the Enforcer did not especially enjoy conversation, he found Lockstock tolerable. The Vanguard asked a few question about Prowl's career with the Enforcer, but for the most part he kept the conversation focused on the Autobot base in general and the range specifically. Prowl listened, committing every small detail to memory.

It dawned on the Enforcer as they stopped in front of the armoury that Lockstock had developed a sort of hero worship of him. This was truly pecular, and Prowl was faintly surprised that the recognition had not sent his battle computer into a fit. He ruminated on this as the Vanguards assigned to the armoury confirmed both mechs were cleared to enter. Prowl was simply not a mech other mechanisms liked; the best he typically managed was grudging respect and even that often came with quite a fight.

The Matrix-Bearer was waiting just before armoury opened into the range when Prowl and Lockstock entered. He was not alone. The Polihexian Prowl had seen Smokescreen speaking with during the demonstration was there too. He was a Vanguard or an operative, Prowl thought as they approached. The mech had been ready to kill the tactician when he had revealed himself to have been in possession of a weapon. Not only ready, Prowl had been wholly certain that the mech had been quite capable of killing him. As the tactician considered what he had seen the cycle previous he amended his previous thought. This mech was definitely an operative.

Wait. Prowl stopped in his tracks. Did that mean Smokescreen was as well? The thought-train caused a painful pinch in Prowl's processor as his battle computer roared into full gear, fuelled by the fear pouring out of his emotional cortex. In nanokliks, his tactical systems had begun calculating not just the odds that this was so but all the manners in which it could go horribly wrong.

“Are you well, Prowl?” The Prime asked. Prowl looked up, not realizing he had dropped his helm. Lockstock had a servo on his arm as if to steady him. Had he stumbled? His processor was burning as his often duelling systems came to agreement, static filled his vision. The Praxian tactican fought back the crash with all of his resources, consciously cancelling each shutdown thread that initiated. 

This could not happen. He would not crash in front of the Prime. The heat in his helm only worsened as this fear fed into his battle computer, giving it another terrifying theory to feast on. A strong arm wrapped around his back, and guided him forward. Prowl was only barely aware of his legs moving. A cool servo touched his scorching helm before it was pulled back sharply. Voices murmured but over the roar of his systems, Prowl could not hear what was said.

“I am functional,” Prowl said, even as he cancelled another shutdown command.

Two large servos that seemed to encompass the whole of his shoulder struts pressed him down. His leg struts buckled under the pressure, and he found himself all but falling into a chair. A cooling pad was placed against his helm, and Prowl jolted at the shock of the cold material over his overheated plating. It worked however, and his coolant systems finally brought his temperature back to normal levels. A klik later, Prowl was actually able to return his attention to the world around him.

“I am functional,” he repeated as he pulled himself out of the slump he had found himself in. Prowl looked around to see that he had been taken into a small office. A servo returned to his helm as the cooling pad was pulled away. The operative, optics masked by an opaque visor, looked at Prowl with an unreadable expression as he held the cooling pad in his other servo.

“Are you, Prowl?” Optimus Prime asked. How was it Prowl had missed just how massive the Prime was? Prowl had to crane up his helm to look at his faceplates.

“I am,” the tactician assured him. “My systems have normalized.”

“Is this a consequence of your ATS?” The Prime asked, kneeling in front of Prowl so that the smaller mech did not have to strain his neck cables. There was a power behind those optics, Prowl realized as he was optic to optice with the Matrix-Bearer and he wondered how much Optimus Prime could see in him.

“No Sir,” Prowl replied. “I emerged with this glitch.”

“A processor glitch?” The Matrix-Bearer asked, concern brushed against Prowl's quiet EMF.

“Yes sir,” the Praxian confirmed. “I have an unstable connection between my emotional cortex and my central processor.”

“You have managed very well...” Optimus Prime said, gravely. Panic flit through Prowl's spark, and he spoken without daring to consider the consequences.

“I am not fragile, Sir,” he insisted, interrupting the Prime. “My crashes are rare. In most cases, as with this one, I can prevent them. I have never crashed during an Enforcer exercise. I do not believe it is actually possible.”

“What triggered this crash?” The Prime asked. 

“An unexpected thought process triggered a surge in my emotional cortex, which caused it to overheat,” Prowl replied. He levelled his most even gaze on the larger mech. Could he will the Prime to see that he was not a liability simply because he had a glitch?

“Your accomplishments are all the more impressive in light of this revelation,” Optimus Prime said. “It must have been difficult to convince the Enforcers to take you on.”

“It was,” the Praxian admitted. “I had the good fortune of emerging to an affluent house, and I was accepted as recruit at my Vicomagister's urgings.”

“Whatever risk Enforcer Command felt they took in recruiting you, paid them great dividends,” the Matrix-Bearer replied. “You have an exemplary record... I must asked, do you believe you would be happy serving the Autobots? You are Praefectus Vigilum in Praxus. It would be a considerable loss of rank.”

“Rank has no value to me, Sir,” Prowl said. “I am Praefectus Vigilum because the Lord of Praxus was compelled to promote me to the rank after I discovered a scandal with the Enforcers and the Senate. He would have done nothing to stop it so I took my findings to the press. It is a cursory title, apart from administrative duties, I remain foremost a tactician.”

“Are you a capable administrator?” Optimus Prime asked. 

“I believe so,” the Praxian replied. 

“I could use a good administrator,” the Prime said, battle mask retracting to show a bemused smile. He offered Prowl his servo, and on autopilot, Prowl took it and he let himself be helped to his peds.

“Sir?” The Praxian asked. 

“The Autobots will be lucky to have you,” the Prime said. “You are a remarkably gifted strategist, and I believe you'll prove to be a fair commander. Some mech reminded me recently that was is tactical sound, can also be ugly, and there are times when I cannot easily make see past the ugliness. I need you to remind when the hard choices must be made and why I am making them.”

“Yes, sir,” Prowl replied. “You have my glyph.”

End Chapter 3.

Edited 2016-07-04. 


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> We learn the identity of Smokescreen's progenitor and a bit more about why he's such a frag up.

The central concourse of the sprawling range teamed with Autobots of all ranks and frametypes. Jazz wove through the crowd. Optimus and Prowl would be out in a matter of kliks. Though the Prime was comfortable with the Enforcer's enlistment, Jazz had some reservations. Whatever the Enforcer had claimed, how could he be so certain that he would never suffer a glitch in the middle of a battle? Such an obvious liability did not sit well with the operative. 

Tales of Prowl's performance yester-cycle had spread through the base at warp speed, no titbit more repeated than his rebuke of the commanders, and every detail was repeated in hushed voices throughout the room. Spying the mech he was looking for, the saboteur inched his way over to the prime spot Smokescreen had snagged for himself. If any mechanism could answer his questions about Prowl and that glitch of his, it was Smokescreen.

As he approached, Jazz saw why the young Praxian commanded not just the prime spot but elbow room at that, in spite of the crush. Sly servos slid together as credits were exchange. The Ops mech smiled and shook his helm. It had not taken much time before Smokescreen had built himself a little gambling business within the Autobot base. There was no rule strictly forbidden his activities. An officers only Triad game ran a few times a quartex and Jazz knew from personal experience that credits were exchanged. He had won a few here and there, lost a few too. Optimus' battle mask made an even better pokerface than Jazz's own visor.

“Holdin' court, Smokey?” The Polihexian asked as he broke free of the crowd.

“I tried to resist but 'Bots are determined to lose their credits,” the young Praxian replied. 

“He's a good shot then,” Jazz said, joining Smokescreen in watching the throng of Autobots jostling against each other as they gossiped and waited.

“He taught me,” Smokescreen replied. “Sort of a family tradition.”

“You're dead-on with that electro-disruptor rifle,” the saboteur said with a satisfied curl to his lip plates. 

“He's at least as good,” the gambler shrugged his doorwings as he replied. “Blue's better than us both.”

“You're brother,” Jazz offered.

“He left him in Praxus,” Smokescreen said, tone soar. “Because the Vicomagister said so.”

“He glitched a few breams ago,” the visor clad mech revealed in a low voice.

“He crashed?” The red and blue Praxian asked, and he turned to face Jazz, his doorwings flared up and wide with alarm.

“He said he averted it,” Jazz replied. 

“If he's up and running, he averted it,” Smokescreen revealed. He grimaced, and shuddered. “It can take joors for him to come out of a crash. His joints lock up with a horrible squeal... I understand it's because all the coolant and lubricant divert from his extremities into his processor to reduce the damage.”

“You saw a few of these,” Jazz said, field wrapping around Smokescreen, sympathetically.

“I caused most of them,” Smokescreen's voice was a low hiss. “So much so he sent me away.”

“Smokey...” The saboteur gaped.

“Looks like it's time,” the gambler interrupted, gesturing to his originator as he and Optimus walked through the concourse and onto the range itself.

“Smoke...” Jazz repeated.

“Later,” Smokescreen replied, tersely, EMF hugged tight around himself. “I was a little slagtard, Jazz. Most mechanisms wouldn't've blamed him one bit.”

***

No one attempted to pass Prowl a defective weapon. The weapons-master responsible for the armoury was a sour old mech long due to retire, and he did not tolerate laziness or stupidity. Kup offered Prowl the choice well over a dozen rifles and blasters. While Lockstock had been correct, and there were not acid pellet rifles to be found, the Praxian did find a laser rifle similar to the standard Enforcer issue, and he lifted it up. Once the rifle was in his servos, Prowl confirmed that it was in fact the same model as those issued to Praxian Enforcers. His own acid pellet rifle was no so dissimilar to this model of laser rifle, it had a laser function should it run out of acid rounds.

There was no whispering on the range. The mass of Autobots that crowded the concourse remained there with only Sergeant Kup, the Prime and the commanders permitted to actually watch on the range itself. For the bulk of the gathered mechanisms, the best they could hope was to watch from the window that spanned the length of the room. Countdown was conspicuously absent, not that this came as any surprise. More likely than not, the mech was off licking to wounds to his ego. He would recover, it was not as though it was a fatal injury.

He knew the commanders were angry. Before Optimus Prime had allowed Prowl to leave the office, the Matrix-Bearer had insisted on applying the Autobot insignia to his chassis. Whatever those mechanisms might have hoped to say or to do to convince the Prime to send Prowl on his way, it was all for not now. The tactician was just fortunate that none of the officers had been present when he had glitched. Though Optimus Prime was prepared to take the risk of recruiting a glitched mech, his commanders who have made an uproar. The operative had not been wholly successful in disguising his own doubts. Prowl had seen them enough to recognize them on any mechanism.

“The targets will shift around whole field,” Kup explained. “From two kilometres out to five metres in front of you, give or take. Good to go?”

“Proceed,” Prowl replied. 

The targets, metal sheets that had been roughly shaped to resemble different frame types, began moving about the field, at varying speeds. They were mounted on wheeled bases that Prowl surmised had been made up of whatever scraps had been laying around. Sergeant Kup did not appear inclined to waste expensive drones on a mere demonstration.

Taking aim, Prowl began to fire. The rifle responded flawlessly, and the Enforcer turned Autobot threw his whole focus into his task. When Prowl lowered the rifle, signalling he was finished, Kup used a remote control to bring the targets up to the front. It had taken the Praxian all of a bream to complete the exercise. Optimus stepped up from behind him, and though Prowl had been aware of his approach, the touch of the Prime's servo on his back came as a surprise. Prowl looked straight a head at the returning targets.

“Well done, Prowl,” the Matrix-Bearer said. “I believe you hit every target.”

“He missed one,” Delta Magnus replied as he stepped forward. The leader of the Primal Vanguard did not so much as glance at Prowl.

“Wouldn't call that a miss,” Kup countered. “That's a civilian dummy.”

“So it is,” the Vanguard replied. “He was not remarkably fast.”

“He was accurate,” the gruff sergeant countered. “If these were 'Cons most of'em would be grey or leaking out. They say you've got an acid pellet rifle?”

“I do,” Prowl replied. 

“Even winging a mechanism with an acid round will put'em on the disabled list,” Kup explained. Delta Magnus raised his brow-ridges. “Good for making yourself a door too. They've gone out of style but they were popular back in my day. Got me an acid blaster.”

“Interesting,” Delta Maguns replied. “Is this a standard weapon for your Enforcers, Praefectus Vigilum?”

“No Sir,” the Praxian replied. “Praxian Enforcers are issued a standard laser rifle, as is the norm for Enforcers throughout Cybertron. The acid pellet rifle I utilize is one I was instructed on in my family compound. I returned to it several vorns into my Enforcer service.”

“That's enough for the time being,” Optimus Prime said, putting an end to the interrogation. “Prowl, let me take you on a brief tour before we discuss your duties further.”

Prowl inclined his helm. He was deeply relieved to be freed from the scrutiny of the Primal Vanguard. The questions were inevitable, and more would come over the mega-cycles and orns. His questions were certainly less hostile than Countdown's. At this particular moment, Prowl's helm ached insistently, and he had no patience for even friendly conversation. It was not just a side-effect of his near crash, but the overload on his sensors. Praxians did not crowd around likes the Autobots. Having never left his city state, Prowl was not accustomed to so many mechanisms crowding so close and the feedback from his doorwings was beginning to feel painfully overwhelming. With the exercise over, Prowl reduced their sensitivity, the after affects of over stimulation however would remain for at least half a mega-cycle, or until he recharged.

As he crossed the concourse with the Prime, Prowl caught a fleeting glimpse of Smokescreen standing with that operative. It occurred to him that he had yet to learn the Polihexian's name. The tactican thought he might owe the mech a word of thanks for his assistance. He would not seek the mech out at this moment, however. The presence of Smokescreen was a flimsy excuse but one that suited his purposes well enough. With a simple flick of his doorwing to his creation, Prowl followed the Prime from the room.

***

A storm of emotions seethed in Smokescreen's EMF. As tightly as the Praxian held his field to his frame, Jazz caught a hint of what Smokescreen was feeling. Prowl had done as well as Smokescreen had predicted, and the gambler was going to reap the credits. It should not really have come as a surprise to anyone. What Enforcer could not shoot? He was not particularly wowed by Prowl's marksmanship. Good aim at a range was not enough to alleviate his real concerns over the Praxian's liability.

“Told you,” Smokescreen said. His voice was slightly high as he tried to control his emotions. “Not as good as Bluestreak though.”

“You haven't told me much about your brother,” Jazz noted.

“Ya,” the Praxian sighed. “How about we meet at Junker's later, and we... I'll talk.”

“Sure, octoginta (80) joor work for you?” The Polihexian asked.

“Ya,” Smokescreen replied. “See you later.”

Jazz watched Smokescreen go, a frown on his faceplates. Before he had recruited the Praxian student, Jazz had naturally gotten a background on him. He knew Smokescreen had been in trouble, more that a bit, several arrests for minor delinquencies culminating in a sentence of five stellar-cycles detention. Smokescreen had relocated to Iacon immediately after his release, and had not return to Praxus yet. It was unclear to Jazz if the young gambler had been banished or if he had left on his own terms. This dark cycle, Jazz would have the answer.

“I should have expected to see you here,” Jazz whipped around as he heard that warm voice.

“Hound!” He exclaimed, pulling the shorter green mech into a tight hug. “I can't believe your here.”

“It's good to be home,” the scout replied with an easy smile. “That was your new protege?”

“Yep, that's Smokey,” Jazz confirmed. “I'll introduce you at a better time.”

“He didn't look happy,” Hound said, agreeing with the Polihexian's assessment. 

“Long story, 'n I'm not sure its mine to tell,” the saboteur replied. “What are you doing here? I'd've thought you'd be getting settled.”

“Trailbreaker's watching Silverbolt for me,” the green and grey explained. “He told me about the new tactician, and I wanted to see if it was the same mech.”

“Prowl?” Jazz asked, cocking his helm at his friend.

“If he's the Praefectus Vigilum of Praxus,” Hound replied.

“That's Prowl,” the Polihexian confirmed. “How in the Pit did you cross paths with him?”

“He gave me his seat,” the servus-frame explained. “I was stuck next to a triple-changer that took a disliking to me at first sight. Or maybe it was Silverbolt he didn't like. The Praefectus Vigilum walked up out of nowhere, and he looked so grim. I read the glyphs on his doorwings and I was so sure he was about to have me thrown from the flight. Instead he gave me his seat in Prime class.”

“That was...” Jazz hummed.

“It was a gift from Primus,” Hound said. “I was done. Silverbolt was done, and I couldn't get a line to activate.”

When Jazz looked closer, he saw through Hound's jovial expression. He was holding up well but the dimness of his optics gave him away. One dark-cycle's recharge was not enough to make up for orns of exhaustion. The saboteur put his arm around his friend/subordinate's shoulder. Not much had gone right when it had come to Hound's extraction. Jazz had not been able to retrieve him, thanks to complications with his current project, and with Prowl's arrival. In fact the Praxian's duel with Countdown had gone so late, Jazz had not been able to even drop in on his friend yester-cycle after he had arrived.

“What happened with 'Raj?” The Ops mech asked. “He was supposed to bring you all the way home.”

“He got called up on an op,” the scout replied. Sensing the shift in Jazz's mood, Hound gave the Polihexian a pointed look. “He got me to Praxus, Jazz. That's all I needed.”

“Somethin' coulda gone sour,” Jazz grumbled.

“I know you feel responsible for me,” the scout said. “You, me and Bee were a team for vorns. If there'd been any heat you would have been there to save my plating. But if it hadn't been safe, Mirage wouldn't have left me, you know that. We were sparklings together. He wouldn't have let us get hurt.”

“I'd be more sure of that if he was on our side,” Jazz said with a sigh. 

“He is on our side,” Hound countered. “Just not the Autobot's. I don't remember this being a problem for you before.”

“I've gotta see the big picture now,” the Polihexian replied. There had been so many shades of grey before, regulations Jazz had flouted because they did not work in the field. That came far less easily now that he was commander. “And I can't see where he plays in it.”

“Of course you can't,” the servus-frame replied. “Mirage has a gift for not being seen.”

***

Junker's was a dive bar popular with the rank and file Autobots. Most of the furnishings were welded and patched from this scrap or another. Overcharged soldiers had a knack for destruction. This is why they liked the bar, at Junker's nobody cared if a few chairs got broken. Jazz found Smokescreen waiting for him at their favourite booth. Technically it had been Jazz's team's favourite long before the Praxian had come on the scene, and Hound had disappeared into Vos. Even after his promotion, Jazz still found the familiar anonymity of Junker's far more appealing than the Officers Club.

“Ordered you a cube,” Smokescreen said as Jazz took his seat on the bench across the table.

“Thanks,” Jazz replied. “I wondered if you'd actually show. You don't like talking about Praxus.”

“I hate talking about it,” the Praxian corrected. “It's not that I hate the place but whenever I think about it, I just remember all the slag.. It's hard to think of it as home.”

“Just tell me what you want,” the Polihexian said, gently. “We've got all dark-cycle, 'n I've got credits to burn.”

“First off, he never wanted me,” Smokescreen explained. He rested his arms on the table and slumped over them. “Every house gets allotted so many newlings a vorn. The richest houses get the most but it's still means that not every bonded pair in an extended family will ever get to create. Windbreaker, the Vicomagister of our house, was nepotistic and always selected his descendants to bud. Maybe somebody complained because one vorn he decided it was my originator's turn. He wasn't bonded, didn't even have an Amica Endura, but that didn't matter. I know origin argued against it, but in the end he did what he always does, he followed orders. Vicomagister picked out an Enforcer designated Barricade to be my progenitor. Don't know how Windbreaker know him, but I guess he thought it would be more palatable for my originator.”

Jazz listened, when the cubes came he leaned back and sipped at his as he watched his protege from behind his clever visor. His spark hurt for Smokescreen but he felt a titch of pity for the Enforcer originator as well. It was bad enough to be ordered to bud, but to not even have had the choice of progenitor. It was unnatural.

“My progenitor didn't have much use for me,” the Praxian went on, pausing occasionally to take a gulp from his cube. “Not at first. He wanted my originator. I don't know why or what it was but he was fixated on him. But origin hated/hates Barricade. Hate's a stronger emotion that my originator usually goes for. The hottest he usually gets is actively disliking a mechanism. As I got bigger, originator's presence meant I had to be quiet, that I had to behave. My caretakers just let me do whatever I wanted if he wasn't around but if origin was home they reigned me in. If they weren't fast enough, originator would step in to impose order. I figured out if I did the right thing, said the right thing, he would go away.”

“Go away?” Jazz asked.

“He tried not to crash in front of me,” Smokescreen said. “He can hold them off for a bit, maybe a few kliks. One mega-cycle I declared I was a Seeker and jumped off a big fence in a cousin's garden. He couldn't see that there was a bench on the other side. I landed fine but I heard this squealing sound, and ran around to see him locking up. There was this look on his faceplates... I screamed like I was being murder, and my caretakers found us.”

“You must've been terrified,” the saboteur murmured. 

“My caretakers took me to live with them in a little flat outside the compound after that,” the gambler went on, as his plating clattered with the shiver that went through his frame. “I hid every time origin came around for a while. Mostly he'd stay in the background even when he was over. I think he was afraid of me. I know I was afraid of him. It stayed that way until just after my third sparkling upgrades. I having a good time. My progenitor had started coming around, giving me presents and taking me out. After my Emergence party that stellar-cycle, my originator turned up, and said I was moving back in with him. He'd changed. I didn't know how at the time but he wasn't afraid of me anymore... He'd gotten the ATS installed.”

Smokescreen gulped down his cube the instant the waiter put it down. Where had his grand-procreators been? Jazz wondered. Where had the Vicomagister been when Prowl had obviously been struggling with his role as originator? The head-mech had ordered Smokescreen created but he had not been bothered with the gritty details of raising the mechling. In the Golden Age, arranged bondings had been common enough, but arranged buddings?

“I hated him for that,” Smokescreen said. “All of my tricks for getting him to back off didn't work anymore, and the mega-cycles of me running amok without a care for the consequences were over. I was nearly a youngling, and I was going to learn to behave. My originator had been getting reports from the school, and my caretakers. My caretakers painted a prettier picture than the school. They'd been letting Barricade come around, thinking I needed my progenitor's attention. When he sprung me from school to take me out, they just let it go. Originator caught on, and they were let go. I got new, less liberal sparkling-minders. Suddenly, if I fragged up, I got in trouble, even when originator wasn't around.”

“I can't see that stopping you,” Jazz noted.

“'Course not,” the gambler chuckled. “I was block-helmed for sure. I would try and get originator angry so he would sent me away again, but I couldn't get a rise out of him. Eventually I gave up, mostly. Got my youngling upgrades. Originator set up a schedule when my progenitor was allowed to see me. He had a list of where he could take me too, and what we could do. Most of the time, 'genitor didn't show. Maybe to make up for it, maybe to make up for everything, originator started to do more than just discipline me. He taught me how to shoot. Taught me how to play triad. It was okay... even good. Then he came home one day and said I was going to have a brother.”

There was an image in Jazz's processor. An originator trying to make up for lacklustre procreating, and a youngling hesitant to let him in. The unreliable progenitor, and the revelation that he was going to have a sibling to take up his procreator's limited time could not have gone over well with him.

“Different progenitors?” The Polihexian asked.

“Nope,” Smokescreen replied. “Barricade. Vicomagister's orders, once again. In the same conversation, almost in the same sentence, origin told me he was sparked up. and that I was never permitted to see my 'genitor again.”

“Why?” Jazz asked. 

“He was a criminal and his influence was undesirable,” the Praxian spoke in an eerily accurate mimic of his originators voice. Smokescreen then shrugged both his shoulders, and his doorwings. “Thing is, he was right. Even when I was a sparkling, those outing we went on, he was taking me along to pick up bribes and other scrap like that. When I was older, I was part of the scams. He'd been teaching me to run cons. When I was getting snatched off the streets be other Enforcers, he was breaking into buildings or beating up mechs that didn't pay his bribe... I knew it was wrong, but it was fun, and progenitor always praised me... I was so mad when originator said he'd been sparked up by my 'genitor again, but I wasn't permitted to see him? We, origin and me, had finally been getting along, and I was supposed to just except that I was getting a sibling and losing my progenitor? No fragging way. So I kept sneaking out to see my 'genitor, and he brought me in on bigger and bigger scams.

“Spawn of Unicron!” The Polihexian cursed as a dangerous glint passed over his visor. “Did Prowl know?”

“Not right away,” Smokescreen replied. “His carrying distracted him and then there were those early vorns with Blue, and he was always busy with the Enforcers. Barricade wanted to meet him Blue... Bluestreak was in his second upgrades at this point. Something about our progenitor scared him. He wouldn't let Barricade touch him and just hid behind my legs the whole time. After we got home he blabbed to originator and I got put on lock down. Origin had put together enough dirt on 'genitor at this point and he had the courts strip him of his procreator rights. I guess he'd been working on it for a few vorns. In the same turn, he got promoted to Praefectus, and had charges filed with all the evidence he'd turned up. Break ins, bribes, assaults, and more slag I never knew about. So progenitor got locked up. Lost his badge, got kicked out of his House. I haven't seen him since.”

“That's fragged up, Smokey,” Jazz sympathised. 

“The thing is, my friends were all his buddies' creations, or scraplets from school,” the gambler said. “So I still got into slag... A dare or a gamble... You know. I knew originator suspected I was still up to no good but we cruised along. Bluestreak tried to get us to bond... It's easy for him... He and origin just clicked where we clashed... Not all the time, but I guess I resented how it was with him and Bluestreak so I just refused to do anything with either of them. I celebrated my adult upgrades by going to an underground party. I don't know why I did it but I took Blue... Circuit boosters were passed around, and engenx. I didn't pay attention to what was going on with my brother, and he got slipped some bad slag.”

Whatever image was in Smokescreen's processor haunted him. Jazz watched him shuddered, optics dark, and faceplates contorted with guilt and horror. Crooning low, the Polihexian slipped from his side of the booth to sit beside his Praxian subordinate. He wrapped an arm around Smokescreen and the younger mech all but fell against him, desperately in need of comfort. His EMF all but begged for it.

“He nearly died,” Smokescreen whispered, barely able to speak. “I got arrested, a bunch of us did. Bluestreak went to the hospital. When he knew that Blue would make it, originator came to see me in the cells. He was done saving me from my frag ups. I was a mature mech, and I was responsible for the what happened for here on out. I took a deal, pleaded guilty to endangering the welfare of a minor and consuming and distributing boosters. Got expelled from university. Did my turn in the detention centre. My sentence was reduced 'cause I ratted out my friends. I got accept to the Academy here in Iacon when I was still locked up. I did a bunch of classes on the data-net while in the detention centre. The nanoklik I was released I jumped a shuttle to Iacon.”

“You didn't give him the drugs,” Jazz said.

“No but I didn't stop my friends from doping him up,” the Praxian replied. He engine turned over as tears poured from his optics. “They did it on purpose. I always called him a goody-two-peds. and they wanted to see him whacked out... I was too busy getting overcharged to see what was happening. One nanoklik I was on the dance floor and the next I was watching my brother convulsing on the floor.”

It was a nightmarish image, one Jazz knew must have been repeating in a vicious loop in Smokescreen's processor. All the saboteur could think to do was wrap his arms around young Praxian and let him cry. The heaving ventilations, and clattering plating soothed after a while but neither broke the hug. Jazz crooned and hummed, offering the young Praxian all the comfort he could. It was painfully clear to him that no one else ever had.

End Chapter 4.

Edited 07-06-2016.


	5. Chapter 5

Though it had only been two mega-cycles, Prowl found himself missing Bluestreak to a painful degree. His brief encounters with Smokescreen had reopened still raw wounds, for both of them, making the absence of Bluestreak all the more palpable. Guilt weighed heavily on the originator's spark. He wondered if it would even be fair to seek absolution from his elder creation. Did he even have that right?

Despite his exhaustion, Prowl went straight to his personal workstation when he finally returned to his suite. Immediately Prowl logged onto the communication grid. To his surprise, there was an official notice from the Hall of Justice. The Praxian frowned at the screen. A note from Enforcer Command, or Vicomagister Windbreaker would have been of no surprise, but the Hall of Justice?

Prowl opened the message, ignoring the dread growing inside his spark. That dread immediately shifted into anger as he read the injunction. All of the careful plans he had put together over the mega-cycle unravelled before his optics. How had Barricade known that Prowl was relocating to Iacon? What could he have said to convince the lower judges to issue this notice. Was he not still in detention?

Bluestreak was not to leave Praxus until the Justices met on the matter. It was obscene. How could the judges even consider what that vile piece of scrap dared to ask? Barricade had no right to Bluestreak. The courts had ruled on that matter five vorns ago. The scrapheap had not even been bothered to fight the petition to have his procreator rights terminated. This was absolutely obscene.

Windbreaker was behind this. Without his House, without a legitimate income, locked up in detention, for the love of Primus, Barricade had no means to mount a court case. But they had a connection, the Vicomagister and the disgraced Enforcer. It did not matter if Prowl had been unable to find the connection, he knew it was there. 

The knowledge that the Vicomagister was again trying to manipulate Prowl's life enraged him. Had he not done enough? Prowl could have wept with the force of his fury, but he swallowed the scream even as he choked on it. His already aching helm throbbed all the more, and with the pain came an unexpected moment of clarity within the former Enforcer's processor. Enough. He had had enough.

Using his anger as fuel, Prowl searched the Hall's public database. After a bream he found what he had hoped he would not. Barricade had been released. Why he had received early release was unclear. Prowl would learn that as soon as he could. For the time being, anger still fuelling his resolve, the tactician brought up Windbreaker's ID on the communication grid, and activated the line. He waited patiently. The heat of his rage had faded to cold as his ATS syphoned near all the energy provided to his processor. Prowl used his ATS like a shield, the Vicomagister would not make him bow this time. No, this time he would not be swayed by debt or duty. Whatever dues the Enforcer turned Autobot might have owed had long since been paid.

“Have the Autobots declined you offer?” The older Praxian asked, faceplates leering at Prowl with a familiar look of superiority. Windbreaker had often criticized the younger originator for not curbing his creations' emotional streaks. Prowl had always thought the criticism was hypocritical, given the Vicomagister's own lack of control over his temper. 

“You will cease your interference in Bluestreak's custodial matters,” Prowl ordered. There was still a part of him that shrank down at that look, a part that still felt like a faulty piece of scrap when in Windbreaker's presence. His ATS ran at full, demanding the vast majority of Prowl's processing power, and that frightened and fragile side to himself was muted, along with the rest of the tactician's emotions. “I will not listen to your denials. You either drafted the injunction or financed it. I want it rescinded immediately.”

“I have no idea...” Windbreaker argued.

“I will not listen to your denials,” the younger Praxian repeated. “Rescind it. If I learn you have violated the courts order and allowed Barricade with thirty metres of my creation, I will see you charged.”

“Barricade hasn't stepped a ped in the compound,” the Vicomagister declared. He knew that Barricade had been released, knew and had not told Prowl. Through the holo-screen emitted by Prowl's work station, the former Enforcer saw the sharp angle of his former guardian's doorwings. His own remained even on his back.

“I am gratified to hear that,” Prowl replied. “I will be filing a counter-motion momentarily. Regardless of whether or not you do as I say and withdraw your motion. If I must fight this matter before the Justices, I will and I will lay all your sins bare before the optics of Praxus.”

“You have nothing...” Windbreaker exclaimed.

“Are you prepared to stake the future of House Ordo on that?” The tactician asked, with an icy edge. “Do not meddle in my affairs again, Vicomagister. You have long abused any gratitude I might have felt to you.”

He dismissed the comm and the screen disappeared. Prowl dimmed his optics and fought to calm his racing spark. The shadow of influence Windbreaker had cast over him still felt very present but for the first time in his life, Prowl had felt able to truly resist it. Never before, when they had argued, had the younger Praxian felt he had the advantage, that he had the will to back up his glyphs with actions. It had been far too long coming.

When his spark had settled, Prowl selected his youngest creation's ID from his log and activated that line. Again he waited for the line to connect but he did not have to wait long. The screen from his workstation lit up with the image of Bluestreak's berthroom, but there was no Bluestreak. Prowl heard a clatter, before his creations doorwing came into sight from the floor, followed by the rest of the youngling.

“Originator!” Bluestreak exclaimed. “I'm so happy to see you!”

“I am pleased to see you as well,” Prowl replied. The stress from confronting Windbreaker faded away as he looked at his happy youngling.

“You've got the Autobot insignia!” The cheerful Praxian cheered. “You're enlisted then. This is so exciting. When are you coming home? When can I join you in Iacon?”

“I must find us a residence first,” the originator explained. Cautious not to alarm Bluestreak, he added: “A motion has been filed within the courts to see that you remain in Praxus. I believe I have convinced Vicomagister Windbreaker to withdraw it.”

“Why does he care?” Bluestreak asked. “He's doesn't even like me.”

“I cannot say for certain,” Prowl replied. He would not mention Barricade, it would only upset Bluestreak further. “He is a mech used to being in control and I have not been so obedient as he has come to expect. At most you will have to remain in Praxus until your semester is complete I do not believe there will be any trouble convincing the Justices your interest are best served living with me, on the off chance the Vicomagister refuses to drop the motion.”

“Two quartexes,” the youngling said, doorwings drooped and expression sullen. After a pause his expression brightened a little but his doorwings remained low. “That's okay, it's not so long. Only two quartexes, not even half a stellar-cycle. You'll come back and see me before that, won't you?”

“The Prime as given me leave to return to Praxus in a two orn,” the tactican replied. “I'll call you as often as I can in the mean time.”

“Okay,” Bluestreak said. “Say hi to Smokescreen for me.”

“I will,” Prowl promised.

Two orns ought to be enough time for Prowl to find a condominium. They would not require anything terribly large, two berthrooms would be adequate. It would need to be in a safe grid, close enough to amenities so Bluestreak would be entertained. He had raised his creations in a ziggurat of moderate size. Anything Prowl purchased in Iacon would be smaller than his home in Praxus. There were large estates on the borders of the capital itself and beyond, however the tactician thought a central location would be ideal. Smokecreen's faceplates popped up in Prowl's processor, and he amended his previous conclusion. Three berthrooms would be adequate, in case Smokescreen cared to visit.

A low energy warning lit up Prowl's HUD, and he remembered that he was long past due for energon. It was a terrible habit, he realized, but if his processor was focused on anything else, Prowl simply forgot to refuel. Getting to his peds, the Praxian walked to the standard issue dispenser located in his habsuite, and filled a reusable cube. He need recharge about as much, if not more, than he needed the cube but it would be futile to try and rest now. His processor was buzzing with the implication of the court order. Barricade had again come back to haunt him.

***

To the Special Ops commander's intense relief, a communicube was waiting for him when returned to Junker's early light-cycle joors. Jazz had been waiting an orn for this source to get back to him. A fence and con-artist in the Eastside of Rodion, Swindle could only be trusted to sell your frame for parts if you did not keep an optic on him, but he had optics on the ground and if something was going on in the dank Pit that was the Eastside, he would know.

“Sorry, Meister I didn't catch your communicube. Not much is happening here, beside Enforcers trying to clean up before Prime makes his appearance. I tell ya they are really getting in the way of business.”

Jazz frowned at the communicube as the message played out. He relied on these cubes to communicate with most of his informants. They knew him as a shadow called Meister. Assassin, mercenary, and all around bad time, Meister was infamous amongst the criminal element of Cybertron. While Jazz might have left much of that life behind when he joined the Autobots, he still had some contacts on the wrong side of the tracks.

The fact that Swindle said nothing sketchy was going on told Jazz that the opposite was likely the case. Jazz felt a prickly feeling go up his back struts. He crushed the communicube, leaving no trace of it, or its intelligence behind. Rodion was nothing but red flags in Jazz's processor. Scrounge and Tread Bolt were due to check in at any moment, but so far it had been nothing but comm silence.

Optimus was scheduled to travel to Rodion to oversee the Festival of Epistemus in seven orn. It was up to Jazz to uncover, and to foil, any Decepticon plots. He had not found any sign of 'Con activities but his intuition suggested otherwise. If Jazz though he could convince the Prime to cancel his trip on a hunch alone, it would already have been done. But Rodion was a state on the brink; it could fall to the Decepticons or it could to stand with the Autobots. With the co-existing curses of poverty and corruption, it was a struggle for Optimus to open the optics and the sparks of such jaded mechanisms. But whatever Optimus might think, saving Rodion from itself was not worth the life of the Prime.

“Sky Patrol calling Meister.”

At mid cycle, Jazz felt a wave of relief as Tread Bolt checked in, just joors from being overdue. Though the call had been sent to his work station, Jazz picked it up on his internal comm. Like any good operator, he had a specialized comm built into his processor that allowed him to use multiple distinct lines and it good receive calls from anywhere on Cybertron. Jazz relaxed back in his chair, peds on his desk as he took accepted the call.

“Meister here. How's the field trip?”

“Nothing new to report,” Tread Bolt, aka Sky Patrol said. “Enforcers remain on high alert in prep for Prime's arrival. The senate is renovating the penthouse suite at the Empirium as we speak.”

“No 'Cons?” Jazz asked. 

“Not yet,” the spy replied. “Lowtech hasn't reported anything in the Eastside, other than the usual Syk junkies, prosti-bots, and hustlers.”

“Report back in an orn,” the Special Ops commander ordered. “Keep your optics open.”

Knowing that his operative's observations matched Swindle's story, failed to ease the nagging suspicions in Jazz's spark. He could not place his digit on the what felt wrong but Rodion itself raised nothing but red flags in his processor. Scrounge and Tread Bolt were decent agents but they were not the best the Ops had to offer, only the best Jazz had available at this time. Smokescreen was nowhere near ready for an op of this magnitude. Hound was on procreator leave, and Bumblebee was in Althihex.

The more the saboteur thought about it, the more he could not seemly ignore his hunch. Jazz's first thought was to head for Rodion himself but he, regrettably caste aside that idea. With the lapses of security made evident with Prowl's arrival, the Special Ops commander had to, once again vet every Vanguard, every new recruit. He had to make certain no Decepticon spies had managed to slip into their ranks, again. That left Bumblebee. Althihex was not a priority, not in the way Rodion was. If the minibot scout could not find anything out of the ordinary, that Jazz would dismiss his unease as a little paranoia. 

“Meister to Goldbug,” he called, tapping his digits in a familiar rhythm on his desk.

“Goldbug here,” the reply came in under a klik. “What's up?”

“Change of plans,” Jazz said. “I need you to head for Rodion.”

“Aren't there ops on the ground?” Bumblebee asked.

“Yep, Sky Patrol and Lowtech haven't noticed anythin' outta the ordinary,” the saboteur explained. “I wanna see what your optics tell you.”

“I'll roll out first thing,” the small scout replied.

“Thanks, keep me updated,” Jazz said. His unease settled, Bumblebee was still young and eager, but he was a seasoned agent, and if there was something unsavoury going on in Rodion, the minibot would sniff it out. They had seven orn to make sure Rodion was safe, and the chronometer was counting down.

“Hey, Jazz,” Smokescreen said as he stepped into the saboteur's office.

“Good light-cycle, Smokey,” Jazz replied. “Feelin' better?”

“Ya,” the Praxian replied, rubbing the back of his helm with is servo. “A little stupid for falling apart on you.”

“Anytime you need to talk, I'm here,” the Polihexian said. He smiled reassuringly. “I'd rather you talk to me than bottle it up.”

“Very unPraxian of you,” Smokescreen chuckled, dryly. “You've never been to Praxus, I'm guessing.”

“Can't say I have.” Jazz admitted.

“The mark of a proper Praxian is control,” the gambler explained “My originator isn't the anomaly, I am.”

“Run that by me again,” the saboteur said. 

“Okay, he's a bit weird,” Smokescreen amended. He sat on the share across from Jazz. It was one of the few on the base that had been designed with sensory wings in mind. “But I'm the real freak. A proper Praxian chooses his glyphs with care. He does not speak when doorwings can do the talking. He controls his doorwings so they only reveal what he wants them too. Basically, I'm too loud.”

“Rebel,” Jazz said, with fondness. “Did you get slag for it?”

“Not as much as I should have, I guess,” the Praxian replied. “The Vicomagister slagged me a lot, but originator never really said anything. At most, he had me because he was always able to see through my poker face. He said my doorwings were my biggest tell.”

“Are you going to be okay with Prowl here?” The Polihexian asked.

“I'm fine,” Smokescreen promised. “You don't have to worry about us. I don't have to deal with him when I don't want to. I am a grunt.”

“You're an op,” Jazz corrected. “Your origin spotted some big issues in our security. We need to make sure nothing else got passed those guards.”

“We're going to watch joors of security feed, aren't we,” the gambler asked, with a melodramatic groan.

“No fallin' into recharge,” the saboteur ordered. He tapped the workstation on his desk, and activated the holo-emitter, and the first of many joors' security feed began to play.

Smokescreen's studies in psychology were part of the reason Jazz had decided to train the Praxian himself. He had no intention of using Smokescreen as just another operative. The young mech had a particular interest in forensic psychology and profiling. With the addition of ops training, he was going to be indispensable. They had a strong bond, mentor and trainee. It was unlike the bond of friendship or brotherhood Jazz felt with Hound and Bee. The best description Jazz had for it was a caretaker bond, and it was absolutely the root of Jazz's nearly irresistible urge to smack that idiot Prowl upside the helm.

***

Shadows could not compare to him. They remained visible, even if they went largely unnoticed. But not, he. He could only be seen if he wanted to be. If he had had the thirst in him, Mirage would have made a distinctly devious assassin. On those rare occasions when he was required to kill, the Towers mech went about the task without leaving a trace of himself behind. As it was, those assignments always left a bad taste on his glossa and Mirage had declined them for so long now, the Spymaster of Crystal City had not attempted to hand him one in vorns. 

Mirage watched. Unlike other operatives he knew, the Towers mech did not have a particular knack for sabotage. He could, of course, plant a bomb, but Mirage did not have the confidence to do so with any regularity. The spy did not trust that he could get out of range in time; his frametype meant that his armour was considerably more delicate, even upgraded as it was, and he took special care not to get in the way of explosions.

He had emerged with the proverbial silver sparkplug in his mouth. When he was home, Mirage lived in absolute luxury. His penthouse sat a top one of the great spires from which his frame type got it's designation. The mechanisms of family had served Crystal City's lords for generations, and had been rewarded well for their service. His progenitor was the current Spymaster. She was no Towers frame, rather Arcee was one of the rare femme frames in existence, the byproduct of hideous experiments during the middle of the Golden Age. It was not anomalous for a foreign frame to serve the Towers, even in so high an office. The best spies were those who blended into other cities, and who blended in better than the natives?

It was at her command that Mirage found himself in Tarn. Though the city was officially Neutral, Arcee had her suspicions that Lord Shockwave was aiding the Decepticons. The longer Mirage walked the streets and alleys, the more he thought his progenitor was right. There were too many war-frames out and about. Had they been in the Arena, it would not have raised the slightest alarm. That wretched place was full of war-frames, most of them slaves. 

Of course, on the record, these were free-mechs but any mechanism who spent any time in Tarn knew that the Prime's claim that: Freedom is the right of sentient being, held no bearings in the bowels of Tarn. It was at the Arena that Mirage found himself a good perch. Every Tarnian and tourist visited the Arena and if there was any chance of the spy catching a 'Con with his brand exposed, it was here. He watched, from a ledge overlooking the Arena's grand entrance as the unwashed masses poured from that Pit after the final death match of the dark-cycle. If the overcharged chatter was anything to go by, the Twin Terrors had won again.

“Let's go to the bar,” one particularly ugly war-frame said. If his size was anything to go by, this nasty sack of bolts was Tyger Paxian. “I wanna celebrate.”

“Celebrate what, Motomaster?” His companion was a speedster, a Kaonite from the looks of him.

“I'm going to Rodion,” Motormaster declared. “Special assignment.”

Rodion, hmm? That caught Mirage's interest. It was all over the data-net that the Prime was going to attend the Festival of Epistemus in Rodion in a little over a quartex. The spy dropped from his perch, and quietly inched closer to listened. These mechs might not have been wearing Decepticon brands, but they stunk of them nonetheless. When the likely 'Cons transformed and raced off down the road, Mirage transformed and followed close behind. The Spymaster was not the only mechanism that would want to hear about this development.

End Chapter 5.

Edited 07-07-2016


	6. Chapter 6

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> If you read my "About me" bit you'd know that I had a little computer snafu. Libre Office does not believe in recovery my files when my computer has a mood swing. Sorry it took so long to write/rewrite this chapter. I've got some RL garbage going on and my muse is a testy jerk.
> 
> Good news, it's a bloody long chapter!
> 
> BIG NOTE: I am waffling on a pairing involving Smokescreen. It would be a background thing, more important in a sequel I intend to write when this is finished. So my question is: Who do you ship Smokescreen with? 
> 
> Thanks for reading and thanks for your patience!

Watching joors upon joors of security feed for the second mega-cycle in a row had left Smokescreen with an ache been his doorwings. He thought about visiting the oil baths on base, but the tri-coloured Praxian was not in an especially social mood. Speaking with Jazz had lifted a bit of the weight off his spark, but it had also brought up more than a few unpleasant questions about both his procreators and himself.

He had been a difficult creation. More difficult a creation, he supposed, than his originator might have been a difficult originator. Many Praxians he had encountered over the vorns would have suggested as such, in any case. Not that they had ever tried to live with Prowl. But Bluestreak did and he rubbed along so well with their originator. Somehow, his younger had always been certain of their originator's love, had always assured Smokescreen of their originators love for him too but the elder brother had never been able to really believe him.

Even before the ATS had been installed, his originator had been good at muting his emotions. He had kept his distance from his first emerged creation, as he had with all other mechanisms. Smokescreen had been too young to understand that his originator was glitched, only that he had seemed different from his caretakers, and Smokescreen had always felt uncertain around him. Even now, he was not privy to the full extent of his originator's processor glitch. All he knew that it was a fault in his emotional cortex, which made the reality that Prowl sucked slag in all levels of social interaction, pretty unsurprising. The problem Smokescreen had with this, was not his originator's glitch but the fact that he knew that Prowl felt emotions, was even hampered by them, and yet he had never actually seen or heard a whisper of emotion from his originator, other than irritation. 

The ATS's affects on Prowl had only made everything more difficult Before the tactical device's installation, there had been stuttering hints of emotion in his originator's field when they interacted, after its installation, it had gone silent. Even the whispers of irritation were muted, and Smokescreen had hated the silence, even feared it. In his memory purges, ones that occasionally still disturbed the young Praxian's recharge, Prowl had been replaced with a drone. Sometimes Smokescreen still wondered if he really had.

The ease with which Barricade had interacted with him, had made Smokescreen's progenitor his favoured procreator quite quickly. His progenitor had made him feel valued, clever, from the moment he had stepped on the scene. Looking back, the psych student was horrified by the tricks and cons his progenitor had taught him as a sparkling. Even when he had known it was wrong, as a youngling Smokescreen has willing learned to break in to mechanisms homes; he had even been an enthusiastic student. The praise and the pats on the back had been more addictive than any circuit booster he had ever tried. 

Barricade had known it too, and had been little better than a dealer supplying a customer with a fix. Maybe some of the affection had been genuine, but mostly it had been a game, a power trip to the crooked Enforcer. Even after Smokescreen had come to realize that he was just a pawn, a joke to his progenitor, he had still not quite been able to cut ties with the mech until after Smokescreen too had ended up in the detention centre.

He shuddered at the thought of the detention centre. Images of his brother on the floor, and then of his trial cascaded through his HUD. Talking with Jazz had not excised these demons, not fully at least. His processor turned to Barricade and Smokescreen walked over to his workstation and logged on the datanet. It had been stellar-cycles since he had last given Barricade much thought and now that his progenitor was on his processor, Smokescreen could not quite chase him away.

With a few clicks, the gambler accessed the Hall of Justice records and searched out his progenitor's records. It was not the first time he had read them. Reading these records was how Smokescreen had come to accept that Barricade was a lousy mech, a lousy progenitor, and a very lousy Enforcer. The question as to what had drawn Barricade to Prowl still lingered 

Prowl had been a decorated investigator when he had become kindled with Smokescreen. Had Barricade hoped to distract Prowl from ever investigating in his direction? There was something seedy there, something the ops trainee had never been able to nail down. It troubled Smokescreen that Windbreaker had arranged both buddings between Barricade and Prowl. Just how did the Vicomagister know a mech like him?

The Ops mech dimmed his optics as he turned his attention back to the holo-emitter in front of him, and promptly chocked on his intake. Smokescreen read over record again, and could not quite believe what he was reading. His progenitor had been released for detainment vorns early, having served barely a fraction of the steep sentence. There were no details as to how he had managed this, only that he was out on probation. What the actual frag?

He thought of Bluestreak. Though Barricade had lost interest in his second creation almost instantly, save for walking the skittish mechling when he and Smokescreen spoke, that did not mean that his interest could not have reignited while he had suffered under detention. There was no one in Praxus with invested interest in keeping Barricade away from Bluestreak. From past experience, Smokescreen knew full well that Windbreaker really did not give a Pit what Prowl wanted; if Barricade and the Vicomagister did have a connection, whose desires was he going to listen to, Barricade's, or his hated many times great grand-nephew?

Surely Barricade would not harm Bluestreak. Smokescreen thought as he chewed on his lower lip plate. The mech wanted Prowl, had been driven to possess him. That obsession had been worrying enough once the psych student had caught on to it. Stellar-cycles in a cell would have given Barricade far to much time to stew on his obsession. Just how warped might it have gotten during those stellar-cycles? If their progenitor wanted to get back at Prowl for both rejecting him and locking him up, Bluestreak was an all too easy target.

Driven by fear for his brother, Smokescreen leapt to his peds and ran out of his apartment and onto the street. The moment his peds hit the road, he transformed and raced for his originator's hotel. Thanks to the late joor, the street were close to empty and Smokescreen sped as though the Decepticons were on his heels. Barricade had been out for nearly over half a quartex. What were the odds that this had happened underneath Prowl's olfactory ridge? In which case, had Prowl left Bluestreak behind knowing full well that his progenitor was out?

 

Prowl did not pace, though the cables of his legs were taunt springs, ready to spring into motion. Instead the tactician sat perfectly still, staring sightlessly at the wall. There were too many variables, too many unknowns, and far too many red flags leading his ATS to produce some rather ridiculous calculations. He had precious little data and without data he could not make a proper analysis. Without a proper analysis, all the tactician had were guesses and he loathed guessing.

One might have hoped that the Enforcers or the Hall of Justice might have been more open to assist, to share information with him, given he had only resigned from the Enforcers four orn passed. The resistance Prowl had met in his attempts to discover how it was Barricade had been released when he still had vorns left of his sentence. All of the former Praefectus Vigilums questions had been met with stony silence. They had rebuffed Prowl's suggestion that they ought to have informed him of Barricade's impending release.

He had been owed that. It grated at Prowl that for all his vorns of service to the Enforcers, he had not been given this basic courtesy. The tactician would never have left Praxus without Bluestreak had he know that Barricade was loose. Smokescreen's life had been all but ruined under his progenitor's influence, and Prowl was not optimistic enough to believe that the convict might not turn his optics onto Bluestreak if for no other reason other than to spite the mechling's originator.

Enlisting with the Autobots might have been a mistake. Though Prowl's conviction that his tactical abilities could be the key for the Prime's army's victory remained unwavering, he feared that he had not fully accounted for the personal risks this move would mean. Had he failed to convince the Autobots to allow him to enlist, if Prowl proved incapable of serving in an army, he had thought that it would be simple enough to return to the Enforcers. The reality of the situation had only now dawned on Prow; the Enforcers were glad to see him gone. 

How was he to protect keep Bluestreak from Barricade while he was thousands of kilometres away in Iacon? Prowl's focus turned fully inwards as he considered the problem at hand. The door to his suite pinged with an entry request, while the tactician was deep in his analysis. He brushed off the interruption out of reflex, only for the mechanism outside the door to begin pinging him again and again. Prowl paused his analysis. There was only mech in his life who would try something like this to get his attention. Just what did Smokescreen want? 

A twinge of foreboding bit at Prowl's spark as Smokescreen stepped through the door, his churning EM field curled around him like a cloak. At first, his elder creation said nothing, choosing instead to stare Prowl down.

“Did you know progenitor's been released?” He asked.

“Yes, I learned as much this yester-cycle,” Prowl replied.

“Only yester-cycle?” Smokescreen frowned. “Why didn't they tell you earlier?”

“Sit down, Smokescreen,” the originator said. “I will bring you a cube.”

Unexpectedly, the young Praxian actually did as his originator instructed and he sat on the large couch off to the side of the kitchenette in Prowl's suite. He remained silent as his originator prepared two cubes. When had the tactician last refuelled? The idea of drinking or eating anything had been making his fuel tank twist since he had risen from recharge. Now the mega-cycle was nearly done and those few sips he had risked in late light-cycle were all Prowl had consumed through the mega-cycle. The prospect of refuelling now was no less unpleasant but then energy needs of his frame trumped his lack of appetite. With cubes in servo, Prowl joined Smokescreen on the couch.

“I stepped down as Praefectus Vigilum, and took leave from the Enforcer's, four orns ago,” Prowl explained. “In order to settle my affairs in Praxus and to prepare my case for the Prime. Barricade's release came after this. As I was not a victim of his crimes, the Hall of Justice was not required to inform me of his release.”

“You put him away!” Smokescreen exclaimed. “Didn't they think he might be a threat to you?”

“Barricade had never made any threats towards me,” the former Enforcer reminded his creation. “Prior to or post trial.”

“No slag, he isn't stupid,” the psych student replied. “That doesn't mean he isn't angry. He's got to be angry, you ruined everything for him! His House as denounced him, the Enforcers have repudiated him. His criminal enterprises are in pieces. If he wants to live the high life again, he's going to have to start from scratch. You might not be within his reach but Bluestreak is.”

“I have spoken to the Vicomagister, he understands I will bring him up on charges if he allows Barricade anywhere near Bluestreak,” Prowl explained. “His school is on notice well as the original restraining order I filed on Bluestreak's behalf remains in place.”

“When is he coming to Iacon?” Smokescreen asked.

“Perhaps as late as the end of his semester,” the originator replied. He hesitated to say more but knew his silence would not go over well with his senior creation. “Vicomagister Ordo filed an injunction to prevent Bluestreak from leaving Iacon.”

“Windbreaker has never given a damn about Blue. Why would he...” the ops trainee started to ask as he trailed off. “Do you think Barricade has something to do with it.”

“I do not know,” Prowl replied. “I have found no connection between them, however the injunction does list Barricade as the petitioner.”

“But you said it was Windbreaker,” Smokescreen said.

“Barricade had no funds, no House,” the tactician explained. “He does not have the clout sneak a motion through the courts when he has no legal ped to stand on. Vicomagister Ordo is behind the injunction, I have no doubt of this.”

“But why?” His creation asked. A grimaced crossed Smokescreen's faceplates. “To keep you in Praxus?”

“That is my suspicion.” Prowl confirmed. “It is embarrassing for the Vicomagister to have his kin leave to serve another city-state.”

“Does Prime know?” Smokescreen asked. 

“I have not thought to speak with him on such a personal matter,” the originator replied. “I have filed a counter motion, and I have instructed Vicomagister Ordo to rescind the injunction as well. I do not anticipate a protracted court battle.”

“Talk to the Prime anyways,” the red and blue Praxian suggested. “It can't hurt and he might be able to help. I know he'd be willing to try.”

“Perhaps,” Prowl said. He had not considered sharing his personal problems with the Prime. The Matrix-Bearer had far more pressing concerns than the troubles of one mech. 

Silence followed as both mechs sat and sipped at their cubes, frames stiff and awkward. It seemed the one factor that had always been able to bring originator and creation together still held that power. Bluestreak remained the centre of their family. Prowl ached to have his younger creation with him, safe and secure. He ached for his elder creation. There had be a common ground between them, beyond Bluestreak. And yet, the originator could not see one.

“You ought to call Bluestreak,” Prowl said, breaking the long silence.

“Ought I?” Smokescreen replied, brow ridge raised.

“He misses you,” the originator said. It was a pathetic statement, lacking the core truth. Prowl missed Smokescreen as much as his younger creation did. Missed him even as they sat together. Their bond had always been delicate; it had taken very little to shatter it beyond repair.

“I wouldn't think you'd want me in contact with him,” the blue and red creation said.

“When did I make such a suggestion?” Prowl asked, watching Smokescreen, searching his faceplates and his field for more incite. “I have always been pleased that you were close.”

“Never directly,” Smokescreen admitted, his doorwings dipped, as his plating rattled. He jumped to his peds and paced a few steps. When overcome or upset, Smokescreen had always preferred to be in motion. “But I'm a dangerous influence. I would have thought that you'd want to save Blue from me.”

“You made a grave error, Smokescreen,” the monochrome Praxian said, looking up at his distressed creation. “Had there been any malice to it, I would have rethought my position. But there was none.”

 

The Towers looming over Rodion were a cheap copy of the Translucentica Heights in Iacon. To Barricade's optics, they were no better than garishly painted whore-bots playing at being courtesans. Ruefully the disgraced Praxian had to admit that he would have preferred to have been housed there than in this third floor walk up one grid over from Shanty Row. It was, admittedly an improvement to their tenements in Polyhex. The Dead End made the slums of Rodion look like the lap of luxury.

His optics trained over to his companions. Blackout and Brawl were playing dice at the table. It was late in the mega-cycle and their shift had just barely finished. While Barricade's frametype kept him mostly indoors, forced to stick by a window and to watch the streets below their base, his compatriots stalked the alleys and slums for any suspicious mechanisms. 

The payout his “benefactor” had given him after his early release afforded Barricade few comforts. When this job was finished and Barricade had to pay his own way, those measly credits sitting in his credit stick would barely be able to afford him a pad of this quality. No doubt, he had fallen a long ways but even the digs here were an upgrade than the detention centre. 

Engex was flowing, and Brawl and Blackout made for decent company. All three mechs knew their job and were happy to do it. Really, it was right up Barricade's alley. Mnemosurgerons under the employ of Megatron were quietly working, carefully tuning the Rodion Enforcers, the militia, and the general who's who of Rodion into loyal Decepticons. All he and his team needed to do was guard the mnemosurgerons from discovery. Any mechanisms who accidentally stumbled into their little project, ended up on the slab with the rest of the “patients” or dead in an alley.

Barricade chafed at the confinement of this worn down apartment. He had been imprisoned for ten vorns in a cell barely large enough to turnaround in and, the Praxian had not yet really had the chance to burn rubber or to stretch his leg struts. What he needed, Barricade thought, was a good rough frag, and not on the receiving end. His processor looped back to the mech who had gotten him locked up in disgrace, the mech who had both accepted and shunned his advances in equal measure. When he was finished in Rodion, Barricade had plans for Prowl but first he needed to see just what these mnemosurgerons could do.

“The tacky runt was sniffing around again,” Brawl grumbled as he rolled his dice.

“That's what Syk-sluts do,” Blackout replied. “Gotta find a paying spike to suck.”

“I haven't seen him suck a spike,” the tank argued.

“This isn't the Dead End,” the rotary countered. “Whores don't suck spike in the middle of the street.”

“He's got a mod!” Brawl snapped. “No way that arm ain't a mod!”

“Lots of mechanisms have mods, Brawl” Blackout replied. 

“Valve mods,” the brute countered. 

“Maybe it helps him stroke spikes faster?” The flight-frame suggested with a cackle.

“Enough,” Barricade replied. “I'll take a look at this minibot next cycle. If I don't see him shoot up or service some spike, I'll bring him in and we'll all have a little chat.”

“Good enough for me,” Blackout agreed.

“Ya,” Brawl acquiesced. “Works for me.”

Good. The Praxian smirked. Even if the minibot proved to be nothing but another piece of gutter trash, Barricade thought he might bring the mech “home” anyways. His spike started to pressurize behind his panel. He doubted his companions would argue, after all it was not like Barricade would hog the runt.

 

The Artists Quarter was Jazz's favourite grid in all of Iacon. When he had learned that Hound was coming home, the Polyhexian had found his friend an apartment in the same colourful neighbourhood he had made his own home in. Crime was a minimal concern in the grid. Neighbours took care of their own, and street artists and entertainers kept their optics open for any interlopers intent on disturbing the peace of their little enclave.

It had been a natural choice for Jazz, upon his own arrival in Iacon, to lay down roots in this grid. Music was often the only thing that soothed his spark after a mission gone awry. Though he had not felt the urge to pick up a cithara or to sing a melody in stellar-cycles, Jazz still found comfort in music. One of his favourite activities remained simply walking down the streets, listening to the various songs the strolling musicians played.

When Hound had arrived in Iacon, when he had first enlisted with the Autobots, he had found a rental apartment near the Docks. His neighbours had been mechanisms like him, foreign-frames, many of whom found their work labouring in the shipping yards, loading cargo onto shuttles, and in some cases constructing drone shuttles. Poverty had been, and still was the scourge of the docklands. The typical conflicts that came from cultures clashing brought Enforcers into the grid far more often than any of its residents really wanted.

This was Jazz's defence for choosing his grid to be Hound and the bitlet's new home. Having another friend in the grid was just a side benefit. Blaster was just a few streets over from Hound's new digs. Though the Cassette-carrier was not especially tight with new originator, Hound had told Jazz that Blaster had already come by with gifts for Silverbolt and some energon goodies for him. Hearing this news had pleased the Polyhexian and only reaffirmed his conviction that the winglet would never want for his progenitors. 

“You settlin' in okay?” Jazz asked as he joined Hound in the green mech's living room.

“I'm good,” Hound replied. “I always liked this neighbourhood.”

“It's a good place for a mechlin',” the Polyhexian replied. It had dawned on him just how young the newling was. Silverbolt was only a couple orns old. This could only mean that Hound had undergone emergence while on the run. “Why didn't ya call for help sooner?”

“I didn't want to be the spark that started a war between Vos and Iacon,” the scout explained. “If they had followed me, any interference on your part would have been seen as an act of war.”

“That wouldn't've stopped me,” Jazz replied.

“I know,” Hound said, a melancholy smile tugged at his lip plates. “I wanted them to chase me, Jazz. It would have proven that they care about me more than they cared about Vosian supremacy. They knew about the plot to sabotage the Tarnian power plant. I couldn't be with them knowing they were warmongers. I wanted them to decide we were worth more than glory and pride, but we're not.”

“I'm sorry,” the saboteur replied, patting his friend on the back and promised. “He's not gonna want for'em.”

“Thank you,” the originator replied with a soft sigh. He leaned back against the couch, and looked up at the ceiling. “It's so good to be home.”

The small suite was cozy and already a little cluttered. All the accoutrement that came with a newling was neatly stored, but Hound was a mech that like knickknacks and simple treasures and he had already taken some of those most precious he had left behind in Iacon out of storage and they dotted the walls and surfaces of his living room. In the coming vorns, Jazz thought sparkling artwork, and toys would take over the space. He doubted Hound would mind at all.

“Why don't you hold him,” Hound suggested, handing Silver bolt over to Jazz. “You look a bit tense.”

Jazz looked up from Silverbolt, who softly chirred as the Polyhexian repositioned him. Here was an in. Hound was on procreator leave, and would remain on leave for at least a vorn; he could not actually participate in any operations but if Hound was willing to lend his audials, Jazz was not going to turn him down. There was no mech whose judgement he trusted more.

“My instincts tell me Rodion stinks of 'Cons,” the saboteur explained after a moments consideration. “Trouble is my sources 'n my spies say it's business as usual.”

“I've never heard you doubt your intuition,” the scout said. 

“Rodion is important to Optimus,” Jazz sighed. “Polyhex can claim all it wants that its Neutral, but we both know Straxus is a 'Con. After losing Uraya, Prime just wants to save the Rodionian's from themselves.”

“Our Prime has a good spark,” Hound replied. “But he is very idealistic. If you want to stop him from going to Rodion, you need proof. I see the problem.”

“Goldbug's on his way to confirm what the ops on the ground are seein',” the Polyhexian explained, grimacing. “On the one servo, if he does find somethin' than somethin's off with my ops. On the other, if he doesn't see anythin', if the 'Cons use the festival to get to Optimus... I wish Big Bot would just listen to me.”

“If there's something there, our little friend will find it,” the scout reassured him.  
“'M countin' on it,” Jazz replied.

 

The streets were quiet and empty by the time Jazz finally left Hound's apartment. They had reminisced for stellar-cycles, even after the new originator had put Silverbolt down to recharge. Having Hound back in Iacon was even better than Jazz had expected. Though he and Blaster were close, it was the servus-frame scout that the Polyhexian operative felt safe baring his spark to. Only another op could really understand what went on in another op's processor. 

While Jazz remained ill at ease with the Rodion problem, his self-doubts had eased. His agents were not green, Bumblebee was especially seasoned by this point. Even though he would have preferred to scope out the Rodion city-state himself, as Special Operations Commander, Jazz needed to learn to delegate, rather that race into the field so often as he once had.

An awareness that only came from a life lived on the edge of a blade passed over the saboteur as he stepped into his apartment. His specialized audial horns detected a breeze. There was no chance that he had left a window open; he rarely opened them when he was home as it was. Dropping into a crouch, Jazz inched deeper into his living room. With a non-verbal command, Jazz disabled the lights throughout the whole of his apartment. Whatever was waiting for him was going to have to face him in the darkness. 

Slowly, and silently, the operative checked each room for the intruder. Setting his visor's sensors to max, Jazz scanned first his living room and then his kitchen. Nothing appeared out of place, so he crept deeper. His office/lair was clear, as well as his washracks. This left only one room. He tapped the door to his berthroom with an open palm and duck to the side. At first there was nothing but an open window, and the narrow strip of light cast from Luna 1. Jazz scanned the room, from his berth to the open window, and saw nothing, hurt nothing but the breeze. It was possible that the intruder and come and gone but he dismissed this thought automatically. He was certain that he was not alone. 

A familiar frame shimmered into view. Mirage was lounging in his window, outstretched arm rested on his bend knee as his other leg dangled over the edge. In a pique of temper, Jazz kept the room dark. He stood from his crouch and stalked in to his room. What had happened to the Towers mech's all important assignment? If Mirage could be here now, why had he been unable to deliver Hound all the way to Iacon?

“I thought you had a job,” Jazz said. The accusatory tone with which he spoke was absolutely intentional. He dropped himself onto his berth and crossed his arms. All these stellar-cycles of work and he still could not positively detect the Towers spy when he was cloaked.

“Let's be clear on something, Jazz,” Mirage replied, his voice clipped. “If Hound were in trouble, I would not wait for you to call me to come help. He might be an Autobot but he is my brother. Don't forget that.”

“He didn't call you for help,” the saboteur reminded him. Mirage did not react to the barb but Jazz knew it had stung him.

“No he did not,” the Towers mech said. “He had his reasons, ones I categorical disagree with, but that is between he and I.”

“What are you doin' here?” Jazz asked. “In my apartment, to start.”

“It seemed like a quiet place,” Mirage replied. “And secure.”

“One of these mega-cycles you're gonna have to explain to me how you broke in,” the Polyhexian said, begrudgingly impressed.

“One of these mega-cycles,” the spy agreed, with a small smile. He turned his helm to stare out at the stars. Both mechs relaxed, the tension between them fading the longer they sat together. With a huff from his vents, Mirage revealed the reason he had sought Jazz out. “There are Decepticons in Rodion.”

“I thought so...” Jazz replied before catching himself. “Wait a klik, how do you know?”

“I overheard a particularly enlightening conversation between two warframes outside the Arena in Tarn,” Mirage said. 

“What business does the Crystal City have in Tarn?” The Polyhexian asked.

“You know I can't answer that,” the Towers mech replied, turning his helm to give Jazz a sidelong look. “The ugly thug bragged that he had a special assignment in Rodion. They didn't have any visible brands but they stunk like Decepticons.”

“Describe them,” Jazz ordered. 

Mirage shook his helm, bemused: “I can do better than that.”

Sharp reflexes allowed Jazz to snatch the small object from the air before he was consciously aware that Mirage had thrown it. As he looked down at the dataslug in his servo, it occurred to the Polyhexian that he really did trust the Towers spy more than he might have thought. The idea that this was a weapon or an attack had not crossed his processor for even a nanoklik.

“I took image captures and recorded the conversation,” the noblemech explained.

“Sweet, thanks,” the saboteur said. “Does the Spy Master know?”

“It has been noted,” Mirage replied. “Rodion is not the Spy Master's priority at the moment.”

“You're playin' a dangerous game, given this to me,” Jazz said. The mysterious femme that controlled the Crystal City's spy network was notorious for her temper.

“The Spy Master is well aware of our... business relationship,” the spy replied. Jazz dropped his jaw and at his stunned expression, the Towers mech only shook his helm. “As long as I do not undermine Crystal City interests, I may do as I please.”

“Does she know you retrieved Hound?” The saboteur asked. 

While Mirage being friendly with Jazz, an Autobot, might have had some strategic value to the Spy Master, Hound was a servus-frame, emerged to serve the Towers, emerged in fact to serve Mirage. His betrayal had not been taken lightly. He never would have been able to escape his former compatriots had it not been for Mirage's aid. If the Spy Master ever came to suspect that the noblemech had betrayed the Crystal City in favour of his former servant, Jazz doubted Mirage would come out of the confrontation unscathed.

“That fact has escaped her notice,” Mirage replied.

“Be careful, spiting that sociopath could get you slagged,” Jazz warned.

“Never mind the Spy Master,” the Towers mech said with a sniff. “I can manage her.”

“Forgive me if I doubt you there,” the Polyhexian countered. He looked at the dataslug in his servo. “Thanks for this.”

“You're welcome.” Mirage replied. He shifted on the windowsill and swung his other leg over the side. “I need to return to Tarn.”

“Why not stay?” Jazz asked softly. “Join the Autobots?”

“I'm not a fighter,” the noblemech replied. “Which makes me vastly ill-suited to enlist in an Army.”

“There's more to bein' an Autobot that bein' a soldier,” the saboteur argued.

“Buying into the Matrix-Bearer would be a start,” Mirage countered. “He's just another figurehead.”

“If you met him, that would change,” Jazz said.

“That would be a good reason to never meet him,” the spy replied. “My life and my loyalties suit me Jazz. I know where to come if that ever changes.”

“Watch your back, 'Raj,” the Polyhexian ordered.

“Take care of Hound and Silverbolt,” Mirage said. “The Seeker may not be through with him yet.”

The spy slipped from the window as his electro-distruptor rendered him invisible. Jazz walked over and looked out the window. He listened to Mirage make his descent. When Jazz could no longer here the spy, he shut and locked the window. It had been foolish to doubt the Towers mech. They had worked parallel to each other for longer than Jazz had been an Autobot, and while the Polyhexian's position and rank had changed, the status quo really had not. If Mirage found something of interest to Jazz, he always turned it over without ever being asked. What else could the saboteur really hope for?

Turning the dataslug over between his digits, Jazz debated taking out his workstation but decided against it. Rather, he opened a seam in the armour panelling of his arm and inserted the dataslug into the revealed slot. After his anti-virus and firewalls scanned the contents, and found nothing worth notice, Jazz opened the files. Images of the mechs Mirage had spotted appeared in his HUD. His armour flared before the video could even begin to play.

“Frag me. It's Motormaster.”

End Chapter 6


	7. Chapter 7

The bright gold and bronze of the High Council Pavilion and the Translucentica Heights darkened into burnt ochre and rust as Prowl drove out of central Iacon. His route followed the energon river that fed the pools of the Pavilion. As he drove farther from the bustling city centre, the traffic thinned considerably, and the former Enforcer found himself enjoying an almost quiet drive. His realtor, a rather delicate looking minibot with a gregarious personality almost at odds with his small frame, had shown him hab suites both within the Heights and in the neighbouring grids already. They, the mech had suggested, suited his lofty rank and lineage. It had taken some convincing before Volks had agreed to show Prowl suites available within the Academy grid. 

Though he was by no means a pauper, Prowl's personal income was by no means extravagant. Much of his net worth was tied to the Ordo compound. Unless he took his ziggurat apart panel by panel, there was no recouping the credits the Praxian had poured into its construction. He had no desire to open a line of credit to purchase or to rent a home in Iacon. There was no strategic value in purchasing property in Iacon; it was not as though the former Enforcer never intended to return to his home city, and yet Prowl had made the decision to purchase rather than to rent without any really thought. This was what he wanted, even if he could not explain or defend the decision.

While his motivation to buy a hab suite was not yet clear to the Praxian, the grid he had set his optic on was a calculated choice. It had taken only a few careful questions to the correct audials to learn that his elder creation was still attending the Academy; Smokescreen was in fact well on his way to earning his Magister. Given that originator and creation had been out of communication since the latter had relocated to Iacon, it was no surprise to Prowl that Smokescreen had not mentioned it. His creation had not mentioned earning his first undergraduate credits while still detained, either. Prowl had learned this fact from the detention centre's superintendent.

He had no right to feel hurt by Smokescreen's lack of communication. It was Prowl who had made the biggest breach. Still, he was hurt. The originator was also deeply proud of his elder creation, and if he could find the right glyphs, perhaps he would be able to convince Smokescreen of this. There was, Prowl hoped, still time enough for that.

Volks waited for him at the coordinates the minibot realtor had presented Prowl the mega-cycle before. At first sight of the building, a low construction by comparison to the ziggurats and pillars of Praxus and the towering Heights of central Iacon, Prowl felt a small spark of approval. Hanging gardens followed the left side of the constructions, filled with fauna Prowl did not recognize. A small offshoot of the energon river he had followed out of central Iacon formed an energon fall at the centre of the garden. The esthetics all met the approval of his very Praxian spark.

“The owner of the hab suite we're viewing was a professor at the Academia for millenia,” Volks explained as the entered the building's lobby and walked to the lift. “She decided to return to Tesaurus, and is motivated to sell. If you find this one to your liking, you could probably haggle her well below the asking price.”

“Noted,” Prowl replied, tonelessly. The red minibot had learned from their previous interactions that Prowl did not make small talk. Still, Volks did not seem to enjoy silence and he numerated all of the suites best attributes as the lift took them up to the top floor.

They arrived at the locked hab suite and Volks punched in the access code. As they stepped in, Volks attempted lead Prowl on a tour. It was not intentional, but Prowl veered off course almost immediately. As he had done during his time in metaforensics, Prowl stopped and study the small room that split off from the great room Volks had let him into. It was clearly intended to be a berthroom. The previous inhabitants had taken their belongs with them to Tesaurus but from the small scuffs on the floor and the walls, Prowl could imagine where and what furniture had recently filled the room.

Bluestreak would like it. From this height and angle, the Praxian could see the narrow energon channel as it spilled into the falls from the berthroom's window. There was no running energon in Praxus and the originator suspected his young creation would never tire of watching it, or even of talking about it. It was a smaller room, by a couple of square meters, than the one Bluestreak occupied in their ziggurat, but it was large enough to fit the youngling's possessions. Prowl visualized a desk and a berth, a datacase covered with as many trinkets as it did data disks. 

Satisfied with that first room, Prowl made his way to the next closest room. From the corner of his optics, the former Enforcer saw Volks standing in the large great room, waiting for him. Still, Prowl did not acknowledge the minibot. Tumbler had hated when Prowl had done this, when they had been partnered vorns before. He had hated how Prowl would ignore his presence in favour of studying the crime scene. For all Tumbler had hated this habit, the Praxian strategist had never changed, had not been capable of changing. This single minded focus seemed written in his code.

The washracks Prowl discovered was sizable, with a small oil bath sitting separate from a solvent shower. One of the few luxury the Praxian truly enjoyed was a hot oil bath, and he was distinctly pleased to see the hab suite possessed one. Prowl looked and listened as he examined the fixtures. They were certainly large enough for his frametype, and so far as his inexpert optic could see, the plumbing had been well maintained.

Leaving the washracks behind Prowl explored the second and the third small berthroom in quick succession. Either could but utilized as an office, though Prowl thought the third would be his likelier choice. The second possessed a fine view of the grid, including the Academy at the spark of it. If Smokescreen ever cared to stay over, he might like the view. It would be wasted on Prowl; he had no interest in scenery when his processor was focused on work.

That only left the master suite. At first glance, Prowl thought the room was really larger than he would ever need but the longer he looked, the more potential he found for the space. A corner by the tall windows would suit as a sitting area. There was enough light that a sizable crystal would easily grow on an end table. When he left the blueprints his ATS had drawn up, Prowl looked out the window, the view was excellent. Far off in the distance, central Iacon glittered. 

He was not particularly concerned with the galley or the great room. Bluestreak would takeover the central living space by virtue of the reality that he would occupying it farr more than Prowl. A holo-emitter, a game console or two, shelves for data disks, there would be more than enough room for anything they might require. So far as the galley was concerned, the energon stove would likely go untouched; Prowl did not actually cook. All he really needed was the standard energon dispenser. Other stables, like oil cakes, iron fillings and the like were readily purchased prepackaged at any grocers

“You may take the payment from this,” Prowl said as he offered his credit stick to Volks.

“You don't want to haggle?” the realtor asked. “Or speak with a creditor?”

“Unnecessary,” the Praxian replied. Volks did not need any more convincing and he took the credit stick and downloaded the payment. He made no attempt to bilk Prowl out of extra credits, not that he would have been able to. 

“I'll get out the paperwork,” Volks said, visibly pleased to have made the sale. In short order, he pulled a tablet, nearly as large as his helm, from his subspace. “You'll just need to mark your glyph on the following files...”

Prowl would not own the hab suite outright until the current owner signed her own glyph but given the Praxian's offer was for the full amount, he doubted there would be any issue. The Praxian was caught off guard by how thrilled he felt at the prospect of owning this home. It was not even the space itself, rather the knowledge that it did not lie on a family plot. Ordo, and by virtue of Praxian traditions, Windbreaker himself, had no claim to this home. This would be the first thing, in Prowl's entire life, that he could claim entirely for himself. 

***

The thrill of purchasing a hab suite did not prove to be a distraction for long. Unaccustomed to leisure time, Prowl tried to distract himself from his suffocating boredom by spending far more credits than he might ever have dreamed outfitting his new home. Rather than transport the berths and furniture that furnished his ziggurat, the Praxian ordered new furniture for his hab suite. When the war end, because it had to sooner, he hoped, rather than later, Prowl had every intention of returning to Praxus and to the home he had built there. It would take a few orn before the berths, couches and chairs would arrive. They would be imported from Praxus or custom built here in Iacon. A Praxian simply could not recharge as well on the berth designed for more standard frames. A flyer's berth was not far off but Prowl found they were often just that much too big and too soft. 

Bluestreak was happy enough, even excited at the prospect of a new room, of new furniture. His possession would be transferred to Iacon when they made their final move, as would Prowl's. For now, all that, and sadly the youngling too, would remain in Praxus. The courts were not moving slowly, precisely but they were not backpedalling as fast as Prowl might have hoped. He had hired a lawyer, a specialist in family law, and the mech assured the originator that they would have it sorted by the end of the current term. 

A few quartexes really was not a long time, not in the lifespan of a Cybertronian, and yet Prowl felt as though he was stuck in quicksand, unable to fully move forward as long as Bluestreak was stuck in Praxus. The knowledge that Barricade was out and about kept the tactician from recharge. All he had been able to discover was that the vile mech was in exile. This was the explanation as to while Barricade had been able to petition for early release. Permanent exile meant that the criminal was no longer Praxus' problem. So far as their laws were concerned, he was no longer Praxian.

It ought to have comforted Prowl knowing that Barricade was not in fact in Praxus, but it did not. The reality that the mech could be anywhere, could even be in Iacon, kept the former Enforcer on edge. Why did Barricade want Bluestreak to remain in Praxus if he himself was not there? Prowl feared that his creations progenitor was planning to sneak back into Praxus to abscond with Bluestreak. What other explanation could possibly explain it?

Mercy came, before the originator managed to work himself into an emotional collapse and a catastrophic crash. The Prime considered it an inevitability that Prowl would step into the newly created position of Chief Tactical Officer. He also considered that some push back from tactical staff and the officers at large as inevitable too. In order ease his Autobots into the idea of having a former Enforcer as a senior officer, Optimus Prime had asked that Prowl observe the tactical team as they worked on the current operation. It was Countdown's project. Prowl was not optimistic enough to believe this would go smoothly.

“Autobots, at ease,” Optimus said as the tactical team stood at attention upon his arrival. There was something about the mech that put those around him into an almost awed stupor. These Autobots did not just respect him, they all but worshipped the Prime. Prowl stood to the side of the much taller mech, observing in silence. “Autobot Prowl will be observing Tactics as he acclimatizes with the Iacon and the Autobots. I trust you will all show the utmost respect to your newest officer. Prowl is a gifted strategist and if you have any questions as you work on Operation Backstop, please feel free to ask for his assistance.”

Prowl felt Countdown's sneer on his back. He was almost, almost amused by Tyger Paxian's pettiness. Better mechanisms, at least mechanisms Prowl might have held in higher regard had sneered at his back, knowing full well that Prowl “saw” their snarled faceplates, Countdown only did so believing the Praxian was unaware. As Prowl had done each time he had encountered smug, lofty mechanisms, he ignored the commander. Countdown would receive the respect owed to his rank and experience, and that was all the energy or concern the Praxian would spend on him. 

“Stay out of my way,” Countdown ordered, as soon as the Prime left the Operations Room. 

No response was expected and none was given. Prowl did not so much as tilted a doorwing in acknowledgement to the mech. He felt the temper, barely controlled, in the other mech's field and chose to ignore it. If Countdown was looking for provocation, for an excuse to attack, Prowl would give him none. There was nothing this mech could do to break Prowl's control.

Ignoring the Autobot commander, Prowl did as he had been instructed, he observed. Silently, the Praxian strategist circled the assembled tacticians as they huddled over their work stations, either alone or in pairs. Each individual or pair focused on a separate aspect of the operations as a whole. It only took Prowl three loops of the room to conclude that Operation Backstop was code for the assault and hopeful liberation of Uraya.

The Decepticons had not held the former Autobot territory for long. They had not had the chance to lay down strong defences, not yet. If the Autobots hoped to to reclaim province before the population was completely devastated, time was certainly of the essence. Urgency oozed from each mechanisms field, and it gave Prowl pause. These tacticians were in a hurry, not just motivated by their own desire to see their compatriots freed but pressured by their overbearing commander. Countdown loomed over one pair, his harsh tone not muted quite enough to fully escape Prowl's notice.

They could not be rushed. Prowl frowned to himself. The minute dip of his lipplates escaped the notice of the Autobots working feverishly around him. It appeared as though might have found the source of the Autobots' tactical failings. Time, a precious commodity or not, could not be spared in tactical planning, not if you wanted your strategy as sound as possible.

His concerns heightened, Prowl paused behind a large Tagonian frame. The black mech shared his former partner's frame-type. Displeasure bubbled in his spark but the distaste was quickly overruled and quashed by the Praxian's logic processor. It was not logical to dislike a mech for his frame-type alone. Determined to repress his emotional reaction further, Prowl crouched beside the mech in order to see what it was he was working on.

A 3D topographic map of the Torus-State region was projected from the holo-emitter at the centre of the Tagonian's work station. Highlighted on the map was an old road, dating before the Golden Age. Millenia of use had worn it into a narrow trench in some areas before it wound its way into a swamp. This was certainly the shortest route from Autobot held Altihex, and it neatly avoided Polyhex, and yet it was most definitely a disaster in the making. Given the anxiety in the mech's tightly clamped field, the Tagonian knew it too.

“What do you see?” Prowl asked.

“The forest of tin cedars and barium firs is a dense wall, tight to the road, for kilometres,” the mech replied, his red visor brightened and darkened as he realized who was speaking to him. He dragged a digit along that portion of the plotted route. “The road gets even tighter when you reach the gallium swamp. You can't even fit two warframes shoulder to shoulder without one of them scraping the trees or falling into the swamp. The large mech's engine rumbled nervously and his vents stalled, but after a klik, he spoke up.

“This route isn't safe, Countdown, sir,” he said, gesturing to the very path Countdown himself had selected. Prowl watched as the commander's optics darken and his lipplates start to curl back. With his attention focused on the map, his subordinate did not notice the angry expression. “The road isn't wide enough past Nova's arch to use troop carriers. When we hit the swamp we'd just be sitting ducks. We can't go into the swamp itself or we'll get eaten alive. And the forest here on the right, it goes all the way up that hill. 'Cons could get the drop of us easy. What's more, it wouldn't even be hard. That forest runs all the way to Polyhex. I just can't make this road work.”

All the bluster bled out of the Autobot commander's shoulder struts. He gave Prowl a quick glare but quickly schooled his expression when he saw the whole of the room watching. Straightening into a stiff military posture, Countdown gave a quick nod to his subordinate.

“Find another route then,” he ordered, turning on his heel, the Tyger Paxian Autobot marched across to the farthest workstation and made a show of counselling the sleek femme working there.

“What is your designation, Autobot?” Prowl asked when the commander made his exit.

“Trailbreaker, sir,” the black mech replied.

“Well done, Trailbreaker,” the Praxian said. With that, he moved back to observe again.

***

Bumblebee had not alerted Jazz to his arrival in Rodion. The Polihexian's already heightened alarm only grew. His attempts to arrange a meeting between his ops already on the ground in Rodion and the scout had come to nothing. Tread Bolt was late checking in, and all attempts to hail Scrounge had failed. Jazz's nstincts screamed that something had gone terribly wrong with his op, and he was stuck in Iacon waiting, hoping that Bumblebee would get in touch before he stumbled into a trap.

“Autobot Jazz?” Eject asked, with a false air of formality. He grinned at Jazz when the Polihexian looked up at the doorway where he stood. “A communicube from Nova Cronum.”

“What's up in Nova Cronum?” Jazz thought out loud as he took the cube. He nodded to Eject and gesture to the door. “Say hi to Blaster for me, Eject.”

“Can do,” the cassetticon acknowledged, then asked: “You coming to the party at orn's end?”

“Gonna try,” the Polihexian replied. Familiar with the nature of Special Operations, Eject did not linger any longer. Once the door was shut, and locked for good measure, Jazz activated the communicube and set it on his desk.

“Ran into a problem, Jazz,” the recording showed Bumblebee laying on a med berth, his left leg a smoking mess. “My transport got diverted to run off some 'Cons harassing the southern outpost in Nova Cronum... Peritus Maximus sort of conscripted me into the fight and... And this happened. Doc said I'll be laid up for a few orn as the repairs integrate.”

“For frag's sake,” Jazz cursed, tossing the communicube into his subspace once its message had played out. He had lost contact with his operatives on the ground and now his trusted and most skilled operative was laid up for orns because some commander had decided to use him as canon fodder. 

Jazz saw red and stormed from his office. The Prime was in a meeting with the commanders, and that was just perfect. Jazz had something to say to all of them. The Vanguards stationed outside the Prime's office made no attempt to block Jazz's entry. Technically, he was one of the commanders anyways, but more importantly he was Ops and neither junior guard was in a hurry to test him. When a snarling Jazz turned up, Bots stepped back and waited for happy Jazz to return. It was just common sense. Optimus and the gather officers stared up at Jazz as he stalked into the room, EM field open wide, making certain that they knew just how slagged off he was.

“My ops are not canon fodder,” he hissed. The true subject of his ire was not present, of course... Except there he was, his image was projected from the long range communicator sitting on the desk, and wouldn't you know, he looked a trifle alarmed. Scowling dangerously, Jazz marched over to the desk, slammed his servos down and glared at Peritus Maximus. “My ops are not just some random grunts you can toss into a battle 'cause you want to shore up your numbers. Thanks to you, one of my operatives is on the disabled list.”

“Your agent was hardly the only Autobot injured,” Peritus Maximus noted, chin raised and expression stern. His tone went grave. “Others perished altogether.”

“Don't try 'n guilt me,” Jazz snarled. “You've got thousands of recruits and soldiers, and if your numbers get low you'll just pop out a few cold constructs. I don't have that luxury. My 'Bots go through stellar-cycles, even vorns of training before they ever see the field.”

“Jazz,” Optimus called him off but Jazz could not quite obey. He looked over to the Autobot Commander.

“Rodion is scrapped,” he said. “Thanks to that glitch, I can't even pretend there's a hope in Pit that the city will be safe for you.”

“That is a serious accusation, Jazz,” the Matrix-Bearer replied. His voice was low, meant to caution the Polihexian. It half worked.

“I've got it on good authority that 'Cons are in Rodion,” the saboteur revealed. “My ops are out of contact 'n the best hope they had to make it out is now on the disabled list thanks to him.”

“Everyone, that's all for this mega-cycle,” Optimus ordered. “Jazz. Stay.”

The Special Operations Commander waited, servos curled into tight fists. Optimus could scold him, if he was so inclined, even fight him when it came to Rodion but Jazz was not going to be moved, not going to be swayed. None of the commanders tried to linger, Ultra Magnus gave Jazz look of reproach on his way out the door, and was summarily ignored. Jazz was not going to mold himself into a “traditional” or “proper” commander, however Ultra Magnus and the other officers might wish it. So far as Jazz was concerned, old guard like him were a large part of the reason the war had even begun.

“What did you hope to accomplish with that, Jazz?” Optimus asked, sighing through his vents as he did.

“Put'em and you on notice,” the Polihexian replied, unabashed. “That's the last time I wanna hear one of my ops as been tossed on the front lines without my permission. 'N now if you think you can trot into Rodion without Pit being raised, I won't be the only one giving it to you.”

“You might have been more diplomatic,” the Prime chastised, lightly. 

“Not if I wanted them to listen,” Jazz replied with a shake of his helm. “Otherwise, I'm just white noise.”

“How do you know the Decepticons are active in Rodion?” Optimus asked.

“A reliable source,” the saboteur replied. At the larger 'Bot's look, Jazz shook his helm. “Can't protect'em if I start tellin' tales, Boss Bot. But if this source says 'Cons are in Rodion, they're there. Besides that, my agents are MIA and that wouldn't happen for no good reason.”

“You want to go to Rodion to find them,” the Matrix-Bearer said. “What of your other operations, your operatives, deployed elsewhere.”

“'Bee can deal with that from his sick berth,” Jazz replied. “We're still rebuilding, Optimus. I don't have a team with enough experience to send to Rodion without needin' to retrieve them myself by the end of the orn. My mechs mighta disappeared outta thin air, they mighta left clues. I've got the best chance of readin' those clues right.”

“You need an expert in metaforensics,” Optimus said and at Jazz's scowl, cautioned: “You're a fine operative, Jazz. No doubt the best the Autobots have ever seen but you aren't an investigator, not in that way.”

“What do you suggest?” The Polihexian asked, a sense of foreboding trickled into his processor. 

“You need a partner,” the Prime said. “I won't permit you to go into Rodion alone. You skills, you are irreplaceable. You'll have to have partner.”

“The way you're talkin' I gotta feelin' you've got somebot in mind,” Jazz replied, holding back a grumble. He dropped himself into one of the abandoned chairs, and sulked.

“Who better than the former Praefectus Vigilum?” Optimus asked, the saboteur's spark just about fell to his peds to join his jaw. “His first Magister is in metaforensics, and it's my understanding that he was brilliant investigator before he became a tactician.”

“You have got to be slaggin' me,” the Polihexian swore. But, from the look on Optimus' faceplates, he knew the Prime was absolutely serious.

End Chapter 7.

AN: A shorter chapter, but you're getting it faster than you would if it was longer! Really! Promise!

If you have a favourite pairing for Smokescreen, don't forget to comment with your suggestion. :D


	8. Chapter 8

It was his fault. He had seen these mechs stalking the docks, and had brushed them off as mere thugs. Instead, they were the very 'Cons Jazz had been so certain were hiding in Rodion. What was worse, Scrounge could not alert his commander that the 'Cons were here. His comms had been acting up for the last orn. Tread Bolt had done his best to fix them, but only his short range comms worked. Scrounge had been due for a maintenance check before he had left on this mission but he had forgotten to ever get it done. Jazz had taken his glyph that he was in good working order.

 

His fault. It was all his fault.

 

“Will y alook at what I found,” the dark green and grey 'Con from the docks leered from the entrance of the alley.

 

Oh Primus!

 

Scrounge ran, dodging around the slower moving war frame, and into the streets. He had to get away, get somewhere safe, and find someway to alert Jazz. The small gold mech dodged the larger mechanisms that filled the sidewalks, and transformed into his small alt mode. Even smaller and more manoeuvrable now, Scrounge sped away from the 'Cons. Enforcers. The Enforcers were the ticket.

 

The black and white towers, twisting together as they cut the sky were a beacon of light to the panicked operative. Though the Enforcers had not been vetted, Scrounge saw no other refuge, no other hope. He transformed in front of the building as the early glow of the light cycle lit up the building. He all but ran into the Enforcer station, where he caught the optics of the no nonsense mech, in traditional black and white paint, manned the front desk.

 

“I need access to long range communications,” Scrounge said as he stood in front of the desk. Even craning his helm, he could not see over the top. “I'm an Autobot.”

 

“I see,” the Enforcer replied. He stood, and looked over the desk. His deep blue optic were unnervingly calm. “I will alert the staff sergeant, and see that you are accommodated.”

 

***

 

“Optimus is out of his fraggin' processor,” Jazz grumbled, arms crossed, and his shoulders slouched. Hound, feeding Silverbolt as he sat on the couch across from Jazz's chair, did not bother to suppress a chuckle.

 

“The first thing you did when Optimus made this proposal was to hack Prowl's records,” Hound said, gesturing to the data disk sitting on the low table set in front of the couch. “From what I've gleamed, I'd say he was a pretty remarkable investigator.”

 

“He's no op,” the Polihexian dismissed Hound's statement with the flick of one servo. “He's never done undercover work. 'N he's been a stylus pusher for vorns!”

 

“Change his paint, and don't let him talk,” the originator suggested. “He doesn't seem to like to anyways. He can shoot. He's a tactician so you know he's going to be cool under pressure.”

 

“Monitorin' from Enforcer Command ain't the same as bein' in the thick of it,” Jazz countered. “I need to know he's able to watch my back.”

 

“The mech practically has optics on his back,” Hound said, tracing the shape of a pair of doorwings in the air. “I think he's up for it. Where's your optimism, Jazz? You aren't generally fond of officers, but this one might surprise you.”

 

“Feh,” the saboteur grumbled. He vented a long sigh. “Got a favour to ask you. You've got Silverbolt 'n all so I hate to... But I need your help while 'm gone.”

 

“What do you need?” The scout asked. Silverbolt made an exaggerated yawn, and his originator shifted to hold him against his shoulder.

 

“You know how it goes,” Jazz said, with a broad gesture of his arms. “We've got ops all over Cybertron. Check ins should still come through my comms but I can't reroute communicubes. You know how to reach me. You know where I'm gonna be, so I need you to sort the communicubes, 'n forward anythin' urgent to me.”

 

“Of course,” Hound replied. “Silverbolt won't care if we're here or at the base so long as he gets his fuel when he wants it. Bumblebee can focus on recovering. I'll handle this.”

 

“Thanks,” the Polihexian said, smiling with relief, before he dropped his helm. “You shouldn't have to...”

 

“Soundwave brought us to our knees,” the servus-frame said, solemn. “But he didn't take us out. You'll get our friends back, or avenge them. I'll hold down the fort here.”

 

A ping at the door alerted the mechs that the third member of their little gathering had finally managed to turn up. The operatives caste each other familiar looks. All talk of Rodion ended as Trailbreaker stepped through the door. The doorway was not designed for a mech of his frametype and he had to twist and duck as he went. As he straightened, the tall mech had sheepish on his faceplates, and both Jazz and Hound grinned, barely suppressing their laughter. Trailbreaker only shook his helm.

 

“Sure, sure,” he laughed, and pointed at Jazz. “You had to pick a minibot suite.”

 

“No minibots here,” Jazz replied. “Have a seat 'Breaker. We've got a cube waiting for you.”

 

“Thanks,” the larger mech crossed the room, and sat next to Hound on the couch. Jazz had picked well there, the large furnishing easily fit the Tagonian. “Shift ran over two joors, and I didn't even notice.”

 

“Busy?” the Polihexian asked.

 

“The Praefectus Vigilum observed this shift,” Trailbreaker explained. He leaned forward, resting his arms on his knees, and vented a long breath. “You could almost see smoke coming from Countdown's vents.”

 

“That mech has a scraplet up his aft where Prowl is concerned,” Jazz said. “A 'lil cyberpidgeon told me he thinks he outta be the boss in tactics.”

 

“He's practically been running the department for a vorn,” the Tagonian replied. “Since Thunderclash was transferred to the Colonies, at least. Most of the generals lay down the grid work and Countdown fills in the rest.”

 

“He's not slaggin' awful but he ain't the master he thinks he is,” the saboteur noted, tapping his knee with one digit. “On the field, he's up there with the best of'em but writin' tactics ain't his strongest suit.”

 

“Part of the problem is he is always in a rush,” Trailbreaker explained. “The faster we can get a battle plan put together and put into practice, the happier he is, and the better he looks. We miss things... too often. Not today though. I saw a problem. Normally Countdown would just have ordered me to make it work, but I couldn't see how, and I was trying to figure out how to get him to see, and Prowl helped. He actually agreed with me.”

 

“You sound like you might be looking forward to having him for a boss,” Hound said, smiling slightly at Jazz. The latter ignored him. Hound liked Prowl out of principle. But being well mannered, being a clever tactician, these did not in anyway guarantee that he would be a good operative.

 

“Maybe,” the junior tactician replied. “He's sort of scary. Countdown practically snarling at him and Prowl just ignored his existence, except to stare him down.”

 

“I'm supposed to taken him with me on a mission,” Jazz revealed. Trailbreaker's visor brightened several watts.

 

“Huh,” he murmured. “Hard to picture him on an op.”

 

“Exactly my problem!” The Polihexian exclaimed.

 

“I mean he was an Enforcer,” Trailbreaker said, thinking out loud. “He would have had to serve some time on the streets. He's not dead so it obviously didn't go so bad.”

 

“That's not the most glowing recommendation I've heard you make,” Hound teased. “What he isn't is a raw recruit. Even if most of his experience as been at a tactical simulator, he's got experience, and lots of it.”

 

“I don't know what he'd do with Jazz” Trailbreaker said, smiling at Hound. “He's pretty... proper. Jazz just might flip his circuit breakers.”

 

“Hey!” Jazz retorted as his friends shared a laugh at his expense. Of course, this was precisely what he was afraid of.

 

***

 

When Prowl was summoned to the Prime's office, his battle computer immediately started compiling a list of reasons the tactician's presence might be required. Of course, many if not most of those reasons were mundane but others were more worrisome. There were no preparation needed for those mundane scenarios, and as was his nature, Prowl focused on the worst case scenarios. If Countdown had filed a grievance, the Praxian could bring forth both witnesses, both of his own conduct and of the commander's antagonistic bent. If he was summoned back to Praxus, he could renounce his citizenship, though then there would be a problem as to how he might get Bluestreak out.

 

Optimus Prime did not make him wait, to Prowl's relief. The great mech's EMF was open and inviting and yet serious. Prowl took the seat offered to him and waited. He was prepared to counter any foreseeable issue; the tactician was prepared to fight for his future in the Autobots.

 

“I know I promised you leave in two orns time,” the Prime said. “There is however, an urgent matter I would like your assistance on.”

 

“What can I do for you, sir?” Prowl asked. His ATS hummed in his processor, he had considered that the Prime might need his service in some form, but it had not seemed terribly likely given he was not even free to lead Tactics yet.

 

“There is trouble in Rodion,” Optimus Prime explained. “Two of my Autobots are missing. Due to the nature of their assignment, I am not comfortable enlisting the Rodion Enforcers in investigating their disappearances. According to my Special Ops Commander, there is a very real chance the Decepticons are working in the city. It is impossible to know who amongst the city's government might be in league with them.”

 

“You do not intend to make the Festival of Epistemus now?” The Praxian asked, he raised his doorwings a few centimetres, an unconscious gesture of alarm.

 

“I have not cancelled my engagement,” the Matrix-Bearer revealed. “However at this point, it is not my intention to attend.”

 

“It is wise not to alert an Decepticons present that your plans have changed,” Prowl noted, pleased with the Prime's foresight. “Should they realize we are aware of their presence, they will retreat to safer territories, and we might never know the nature of their plan.”

 

“That was my concern,” Optimus Prime agreed. “I would like you to accompany the Head of Special Operations into Rodion. There are other Enforcers, former or still active, enlisted with the Autobots, but none of your extensive experience in metaforensics and investigations. If the missing agents can be found, I have faith you will find them. Alive, I hope.”

 

“The operatives will have been trained to resist torture; it is reasonably possible that they are still amongst the functional,” the former Enforcer said. The odds were not especially good, fifty-fifty but even if they were in the Well, it was vital for Autobot security for them to learn if the operatives broke under interrogation, or if they took their secrets with them to the smelter.

 

“Jazz will have lead on the mission, as he's both senior officer and senior operative,” the Prime explained further. “He is... a remarkable and irregular mech but brilliant in his role, as you are in yours. I hope you can work together.”

 

“I can work with anyone,” Prowl replied. He flicked his doorwing a fraction. “They do not tend to work well with me.”

 

“There's a difference?” Optimus Prime asked, he canted his helm, as his optics looked past the Praxian's faceplates to his doorwings.

 

“Emotions,” the tactician explained. “I have been called many things, I suppose the most flattering is frustrating.”

 

“Your emotions don't interfere?” the Matrix-Bearer asked.

 

“No,” Prowl said, though he doubted the Prime would actually really believe him. “It would not be tactically sound to allow it.”

 

“Jazz can have an interesting affect on mechanisms,” Optimus Prime warned. “It's possible that you'll complete your investigation before your scheduled leave, if not I promise I will reschedule for the mega-cycle you return.”

 

“That will not be a problem, sir,” the Praxian replied. “Bluestreak will understand. He is accustomed to my duties taking me away at undesirable times.”

 

The Prime gave him a soft but penetrating look, and Prowl regretting his glyphs. His devotion to duty to not paint him as an originator in a flattering light, but then Smokescreen was amongst the Autobots, and his elder creation's record would have reflect positively on him either.

 

“My duties have always come before my family,” Prowl said. “Enforcer investigations do not pause for holidays or celebrations.”

 

“No they don't,” the Matrix-Bearer agreed, and for a moment looked through him. “War is the same.”

 

“Yes sir,” the tactician replied.

 

He would go on the mission, both because he could assist and because he needed to prove to this mech that he could do more than stand in a tactical hub, or file datadiscs. Still, Barricade, and the knowledge that he could be anywhere, even in Iacon weighed on his processor. There would be no keeping in contact with Bluestreak or Windbreaker while he was gone, no way to keep certain that his creation was where he was meant to be.

 

“Something is troubling you,” Optimus Prime observed. “Tell me what is on your processor.”

 

“You must have other Praxians in your ranks,” Prowl said.

 

“A few,” the Prime confirmed. “Your framekin are often passionate pacifists. Not many have joined the war.”

 

“Are there any others, beyond myself and Smokescreen in Iacon?” The originator asked.

 

“No,” the Prime replied. “Most actually remain in Praxus, having finished their training, they only join their units if they are to be deployed. Other's are in the colonies.”

 

“I see,” the tactician said, his doorwings dipped with overwhelming relief. At the very least, Barricade was not here.

 

“Prowl, why are you concerned about the presence of Praxians?” Optimus Prime asked. Prowl straightened his doorwings, embarrassed to have been so open, and emotive in front of the Prime. Smokescreen's glyphs echoed in his helm, and Prowl took a rare leap of faith.

 

“The progenitor of my creations was released from detention last quartex,” he explained. “Barricade was sent into exile, and I do not know where he has gone.”

 

“Is he a danger to you?” The Matrix-Bearer asked, his field fell over Prowl. The nonverbal promise of protection was clear.

 

“No,” the tactician replied. “He has never made threats against me. I am concerned for my youngling. I have been barred from taking him from Praxus and I believe Barricade had a part in it.”

 

“That is troubling,” Optimus Prime agreed. “Who is watching over him?”

 

“Our Vigomagister is his legal guardian in my absence, by nature of Praxian law,” Prowl explained. “One of my cousins has taken on his cycle to cycle care.”

 

“Is he safe?” The Prime asked.

 

“I believe so,” the originator replied. “The compound is secure, and his school is aware of the situation.

 

“But you worry,” Optimus Prime said. “You taken steps to lift the bar so he can join you?”

 

“Yes,” Prowl confirmed. “The House of Justice is moving slowly.”

 

“Go to Rodion,” the Matrix-Bearer ordered. “Find out what happened to my missing Autobots. While you are there, I will see if I can nudge the Justices along.”

 

“Thank you, Prime,” the Praxian said, nodding his doorwings in gratitude.

 

“You're welcome,” Optimus Prime replied. “I'm glad you spoke up.”

 

It did not come as a surprise to Prowl when the Polihexian who had witnessed his crash entered the Prime's office a bream later. He had already come to the conclusion that this mech was, if not the director of Special Operations, a senior operative. Jazz walked over to join them at the desk. He walked with a casual grace, but Prowl saw the lethal training in his fluid movements. What specific martial arts the mech had trained in, the Praxian could not guess but he suspected that Jazz was familiar with more than just street fighting.

 

“Prowl has agreed to accompany you to Rodion,” the Prime explained. “As we discussed, Jazz will lead the operation as senior operative. Your experience, Prowl, in metaforensics and investigations is what I hope you can lend to this mission.”

 

“Yes, sir,” Prowl agreed. Jazz watched him with a similar intensity as Countdown had, but without obvious menace. There was no doubt that he was being measured for weakness or flaw.

 

“Have you been in a firefight, Prowl?” The operative asked. His tone was conversational, even friendly.”

 

“Yes,” the Praxian replied. “During more than one investigation it was necessary to use lethal force against a suspect.”

 

“Was that why you left metaforensics?” Jazz asked.

 

“No,” Prowl replied, firmly shutting down any notion that taking a life could cripple him. “I was of better service to the Enforcers in a tactical role and was transfer accordingly.”

 

“Let's hope you haven't forgotten,” the Polihexian said, ending his interrogation. The Prime gave both mechs a look of warning. Neither reacted. “The bots we're lookin' for are Tread Bolt and Scrounge. Their last contact was an orn ago. When another source told me 'Cons were scurrying around Rodion, I tried to make urgent contact. They never answered and they missed their last two check ins.”

 

“It is safe to assume they have fallen into Decepticon servos,” Prowl said.

 

“They're seasoned ops,” the Polihexian went on. “They know... More than enough to compromise my department, 'n the security of most if not all our bases. They've got programs in place to wipe their processors of “sensitive” information but they would have to initialize them. I can't guarantee they have. If their alive, even if they've fragged up and wiped their entire memory banks, even if the 'Cons have fried their processors, we've got hard copies here, and they can be restored.”

 

Jazz sat back in his chair and looked between Prowl and the Prime. It was clear the operative was uneasy with the loss of his agents. Despite his glyphs, he was not confident that they lived, or that they might be saved. It was intriguing to Prowl that the missing mechs had their personality components backed up in Iacon. Such a procedure had never occurred to Prowl. Mnemosurgery must have been involved in creating the back ups. It was one of the few sciences the Praxian felt squeamish of.

 

“Thing is, recovering them ain't the priority,” Jazz explained, after a brief silence. “Figurin' out what the 'Cons are up to and crashin' their party is. The most direct way to the 'Cons should be my mechs so I hope we can do both.”

 

“Understood,” Prowl replied. “What is your plan in the event either of us is captured.”

 

“If it's just me, get Iacon on the line for an evac,” the operator replied. “I've been in 'Con servos more'n once and I've good at gettin' out. Hound, he's in charge of Ops while I'm out in the field, knows who to call if I need help... What about you, Prowl? Got any security in that ATS of yours?”

 

“Several layers of fire walls,” the Praxian explained. “And a self-destruct mechanism.”

 

“When was that installed?” Optimus Prime asked, with alarm and disapproval.

 

“When the ATS was,” Prowl replied. “It could never be allowed to fall into criminal, or enemy servos. Upon my demise, a charge will detonate, eliminating its extraction from my frame. If my firewalls were to fail, I would self detonate to prevent my core systems from being accessed.”

 

“Good,” Jazz said. Both he and Prowl could feel the heat of Optimus Prime's narrowed optics, Jazz shook his helm at the Autobot Commander. “It's ugly Bossbot, but he's right. Got similar things in my processor for the same reason. Haven't used mine yet, 'n neither has he.”

 

“I want you both back alive,” the Prime ordered. “Processors intact. If the mission must be abandoned, so be it. Understood.”

 

“Yes, sir,” the tactician replied.

 

“Got it,” came his partner's reply. “Alright Prowl. Why don't you follow me. I've gotta stop by the mess hall 'n see a mech for a klik 'n then we can go over some details.”

 

They did not speak as they walked through the palace and into one of the secondary structures. Prowl followed the Special Operations Commander. As they walked, several Autobots hailed or greeted Jazz, who cheerfully waved back. The operative was clearly popular with his fellow mechanisms. It seemed to conflict with the nature of the Polihexian's service to the Autobot army.

 

The mech shed his deadly cloak when ease, replacing it with a more inviting face. Were his friendly airs a mask or the true him? Prowl felt a twinge of envy. More and more mechanisms called out the Polihexian's name as they entered the barracks, and he seemed happy with the interactions. Behind him, Prowl was already feeling mildly claustrophobic.

 

From the looks of the barracks, many of the Autobots stationed in Iacon lived within the borders of the Prime's Palace. It was not exactly a surprise. Autobots came from all over Cybertron, and it was cheaper and easier for them to take housing within the base. Those Autobots with families in the city would not have chosen the on base housing. The barrack's hab suites were not meant to hold entire families.

 

From the entrance of the common room, located at the spark of the barracks, Jazz stopped just in the entrance, his helm turning as he searched the room. He waved, obviously having spotted his friend. Their arrival must have coincided with the scheduled fuel break for a large number of the on duty Autobots. Jazz began to make his way around the small and large groups of mechanisms either seated or standing as they refuelled and chattered. The noise volume alone was unpleasant but the crush was far worse for the Praxian. He angled his doorwings as best he could to avoid contact with strange Autobots but that did not stop mechs and femmes from brushing against him. None of the contact was purposeful, still Prowl became increasingly annoyed with it.

 

Three steps behind the Polihexian, Prowl stopped. Jazz kept walking,, not having noticed. He arrived at the table, and draped his arm around the cassette-carrier seated there. It was not the sight of the cassette-carrier that caught the tactician's notice. Though that frame-type was nearly extinct, and it was a marvel to see one amongst the Autobots, Prowl barely noticed him. Standing across the table from the cassette-carrier, back to the rest of the room, stood a mech the Praxian had thought he would never see again, had hoped never to see again.

 

Before Tumbler could turn around and see him, Prowl did an about face, and walked back through the crowd and out of the room. It was not Barricade, which was perhaps a bit of a comfort but not enough of one to offer Prowl any sense of relief. First his elder creation, now his off and on again lover. It seemed the Autobot cause attracted mechanisms he was in conflict with. The irritation he felt, as he walked from the barracks was more with himself than with the Tagonian. Though vorns had passed, the emotions the sight of Tumbler could inspire in him angered Prowl. All that had passed between them was past, the only thing his spark should have felt was cold.

 

He and Jazz were meant to discuss the Rodion mission after the Polihexian finished with the common room. Let Jazz find him. Prowl was not in any mood be cordial with that mech. Tumbler, of all mechanisms. The Praxian breathed a quick, vent. Chromedome. Not Tumbler, the mech had changed his designation halfway through their acquaintance. Seeing the armoury in the distance, Prowl found focus and purpose. What better place to vent the anger and betrayal still bleeding from his spark than a gun range?

 

***

 

When Jazz turned to introduce Prowl, he discovered the Praxian had disappeared. At first, he felt a flare of irritation but brushed it aside. Even Smokescreen, an obviously more outgoing Praxian, avoided the common room at peak joors. Could it really be surprising that his originator would take one look at the room and bolt? A glyph of warning would have been nice but the saboteur brushed his annoyance aside.

 

“My mech, glad I found you,” he said, clapping Blaster on the back. He grinned at the small mech sitting across from his friend. “Rewind, it's been a while.”

 

“A temporary transfer,” the cassetticon replied, he gestured to his Conjunx Endura, who was turning away from the table even as Rewind spoke. “Communications needed another set of servos while Playback takes a vacation. Chromey had some holidays banked so he followed along.”

 

“Uh yah,” Chromedome said, turning his helm back to the table. “I haven't seen Iacon in a while.”

 

“Enjoy your down time,” Jazz said. “Blaster, I gotta take a rain check on the party. Somethin's come up.”

 

“Something, huh?” Blaster asked. “Who's going with you?”

 

“Our new tac,” the saboteur replied. He had dismissed Chromedome's distraction a nanoklik earlier as nothing, but quick, surprised jerk of his shoulders was not so easily ignored. That said, he had no time to ponder the processor of the mnemosurgeon.

 

“Huh,” the cassette-carrier hummed, he shrugged his broad shoulders and said: “Enforcer's probably not a bad match for you. You can be the bad cop.”

 

“What, you don't think I'm nice?” Jazz joked. His unease with the pairing had not really dissipated. Fine, he knew the mech could think. He could even shoot. But Jazz had his doubts if the mech could improvise without crashing.

 

“Sure, you're a sweet as energon goodies,” Blaster replied. “Can you join us for a cube?”

 

“Yah, I can spare a klik,” the Polihexian said. “Gotta wait for some chips to fall into place anyways,”

 

“I'll grab it for you Jazz,” Chromedome volunteered, heading for the energon dispenser before Jazz could reply.

 

“Thanks, mech,” Jazz called as he took his seat. “So Playback is finally taking a break?”

 

“A whole quartex,” Rewind replied.

 

“Can't say he don't deserve it,” the saboteur said. “Never met a mech that takes fewer orns off.”

 

“Prowl will probably taken that crown after a vorn,” Chromedome interjected as he returned with the Polihexian's cube. “He barely took a mega-cycle off, let alone an orn.”

 

“You know Prowl?” Jazz asked, surprised. He listened, half distracted by the quick calls running through his internal comms. Transport had been arranged, a lousy motel had been booked. Alias, and the appropriate identification were the last detail the saboteur needed to sort out.

 

“I worked metaforensics in Praxus vorns ago,” the Tagonian explained, glancing at Rewind. “Got partnered with Prowl whenever they decided he needed one.”

 

“Good as I'm hearin'?” the Polihexian asked.

 

“Probably the best,” Chromedome replied, he sat next to Rewind, brushing his Conjunx Endura with his far larger arm. “Doesn't make him fun to work with. He's an aft. It's his way, or his way. You learn to go along with it or you get out. I did.”

 

“Guess we're gonna be in for an interestin' experience together,” Jazz said, as he shrugged nonchalantly. “See how far both of us can bend.”

 

“Take care of yourself...” Blaster ordered. Cube finished, Jazz rose.

 

“Always,” the Polihexian promised. “Hope to see you when I get back, Rewind. Good seein' you Chromedome.”

 

What a small world. Chromedome had been a reservist with the Autobots for vorns before he had taken on active duty, around when he and Rewind had hooked up. Jazz did the math and concluded that it must have been during his reservist vorns that Chromedome had served in the Praxian Enforcers. It surprised the Polihexian that the Tagonian had been hired by the Enforcers in Praxus. Like many of the city-states than made up Cybertron, Praxus was insular and foreign frames rarely found their fortune in the city's pretty backdrop.

 

It had not been the crush of the common room that had chased Prowl out. This also explained why the Praxian had not simply said he was leaving. Odds were, so far as Jazz read it, the new tactician did go for public confrontations. There were, the saboteur also knew, two sides, often even more, to every conflict. Chromedome had said his piece, just as Smokescreen had. Jazz doubted it would be so easy to get Prowl to say his.

 

The Praxian had agreed that Jazz was team lead, if he was an uncompromising as Chromedome suggested, then the Rodion mission was going to be even more of a Pit. Jazz would allow that the former metaforensics investigator had considerably more experience on that side. But this was not an Enforcer investigation, this was a Special Operations mission. Prowl would need to bend, need to take orders and directions or they might both be as good as dead.

 

Rather than track the Praxian the fun way, that is _track_ him, Jazz found the nearest directory and tapped away. In a few short clicks, his quarry had been located. Why Prowl had selected the range to escape to, Jazz could only guess. His choice, however gave the saboteur the perfect opportunity to put his new “teammate” through a final test. There was more than one way into the Armoury, and therefore the range. The saboteur knew every short cut and every bolt hole hidden throughout the Prime's Palace and the Autobot base within its grounds. Kup loathed it when Jazz bypassed his beloved sign in screen but as long as the Polihexian did not actually try to access the armoury or use the range, the old sergeant would leave him in peace... Probably.

 

Circling around the armoury, to the walls that protected any random 'Bots from getting hit with stray rounds, Jazz found the maintenance access for the drone shed. Though security had up their game when it came to the lock's encryption, no lock could keep the saboteur out. In under half a bream, Jazz was in. He wriggled through the stored drones, and the makeshift “targets” Kup was forever tinkering with.

 

“One of these days, you're gonna learn to use the actual door,” Kup huffed, cy-gar clench between his denta.

 

“That is a door,” Jazz countered, completely unrepentant. “Call it my private entrance.”

 

“Hmph,” the sergeant sneered. “You here to spy on the Praxian?”

 

“Here to collect him, we're goin' out on the field together,” the saboteur replied.

 

“Mech like that probably walks around with a full compliment of ammo,” Kup said, twisting the cy-gar in his mouth as he thought out loud. “Couldn't hurt to take a few extra boxes, though.”

 

“Do you know if he's got any other weapons?” Jazz asked. He scanned the surface of the old mech's work bench, and the wall it leaned against. A few new gadgets caught his optics and he selected a dozen small explosives and booby traps. These were not Kup's inventions, rather an old friend who taught at the Academy. Wheeljack was both infamous and legendary.

 

“Rocket launcher from his PETU cycles,” the sergeant replied. “Don't know if he has rounds for it.”

 

“He'll probably see you be he leaves,” the Polihexian said. Shoulder rockets were hardly a subtle weapon, not what you would usually bring on an op but he was not going to turn his olfactory ridge up at it. “I'm gonna join'm, can you dig it?”

 

“You mean sneak up on him?” Kup asked with a snort. “Watch you don't get shot.”

 

So long as the mech was not practising with his rockets, Jazz was not too worried. Kup's hideout opened up onto the shooting platform, just out of sight of the ranges sole occupant. Prowl was not using his rocket launcher, to the Polihexian's relief. Jazz assumed Prowl stored in his subspace as he himself stored his additional weapons, most mechanisms did.

 

The Praxian was fully focused on the field in front of him. Unlike his prior “test”, this time Prowl was using actually drones for his targets. They moved far more quickly, more like sentient mechanisms. They needed more skill and more focus to hit, and Prowl had plenty of both. His doorwings were tilted towards the field. They shifted as he aimed and shot. Jazz had heard doorwings described as optics on a mech's back. Now he wondered if they served more as a second, broader set of optics on the front of the mech. With his curiosity peeked, Jazz inched forward, crouched low, approaching from behind and to the left of the Praxian. He watched Prowl's doorwings for signs that he had been spotted, ready to spring out of the way if his partner proved trigger happy.

 

Jazz only made it one more step forward before he saw the Praxian's plating flare subtly. He was jumping out of the way even as Prowl turned, taking him just out of range of the Praxian's acid pellet rifle as it pointed where he had last been crouching. Prowl held his fire, and lowered his weapon. The Praxian watched the still crouched Jazz with steely optics. At first, the saboteur's smile was small, but it quickly morphed into a broad grin.

 

“Not bad,” he said, climbing to his peds. “Fraggin' good, actually. When did you know it was me?”

 

“As I turned,” Prowl replied. “I did not have your spark signature recorded. That has been corrected.”

 

“They got sensors front 'n back?” Jazz asked, gesturing to the Praxian's doorwings.

 

“Affirmative,” the tactician confirmed. He returned his weapon to his subspace, and terminated his exercise at the control panel he had been standing behind. Jazz stepped up beside him and looked over his handiwork. The downed drones all bore signs of laser fire.

 

“You didn't use your acid pellets?” He asked.

 

“There is no logic to wasting ammunition on a training exercise,” the Praxian replied.

 

“We're leaving this dark-cycle, primum joor,” Jazz explained, conversationally. “If you need anymore rounds, or any other kit, have it by then.”

 

“Noted,” Prowl said. “Where am I to meet you?”

 

“The base as a private airstrip,” the saboteur explained. “A cargo jet's gonna drop in 'n pick us up on its way to Rodion. Rodion's got no idea we're comin' and it's gonna stay that way.”

 

“Understood,” the tactician replied. Jazz wondered if these one glyph answers were par for the course or if Prowl was having a snit.

 

“I've got IDs bein' made for us as we speak,” Jazz revealed. “Havin' access to the Enforcers might help but it'll raise brow ridges if the Praxian Praefectus Vigilum's turns up in Rodion without notice.”

 

“I have saved all of my previous colour nanite settings,” Prowl offered. “Is it preferable that I take a civilian identity to begin?”

 

“Yah, that'd be perfect,” the Polihexian replied, colour him impressed. He had dozens of nanite settings saved but he recognized that this was hardly normal. “'M gonna collect our IDs. See you in a few joors.”

 

“Yes, sir,” the tactician said. Jazz nearly sputtered at the Praxian's back as he walked away. No mechanism called him sir. If only he could actually say if this was Prowl deferring to him, or mocking him.

 

***

 

The sky was darkening as the dark-cycle came closer. Before he had left the Armoury, Kup had supplied Prowl with ammunition for his rocket launchers and two more boxes of acid rounds. He had also given the Praxian several emergency rations to add to the field medic kit Prowl had kept since his early Enforcer cycles. Prowl did not believe he could be further prepared for the mission he was facing. There was only two more things he needed to do before he met Jazz at the runway; he needed to inform Bluestreak that he would likely be later in rejoining him in Praxus, and he needed to check out of his hotel.

 

“Prowl!” Chromedome's voice stopped Prowl in his tracks, just in front of the Prime's Palace. The Praxian cursed inwardly as his energon went cold. He curled his servos into fists before relaxing them again. What exactly did this mech hope to gain from confronting him here, now?

 

“Hello, Chromedome,” Prowl said, the amplitude of his monotone, notably lower. When he turned to face the mech, he saw  Chromedome's irritation, plain on his faceplates . The Tagonian was no stranger to Prowl's tells,  after all .  Still, Prowl made no attempt to further suppress his reactions.  Let  Chromedome  see that Prowl was annoyed by his interruption. He  _ was  _ annoyed.

 

End Chapter 8.

 


	9. Chapter 9

“What do you think you're doing here?” The mnemosurgeon asked, harshly. “Think the Autobots need _you_ to save them from the Decepticons?”

 

“My motivations for enlisting are none of your concern,” the Praxian replied. He was not going to explain himself to this mech, defend himself to this mech. He did believe the Autobots needed this skills, but  Prowl was not about to reveal that to Chromedome. There was no logic in feeding into his tantrums.

 

“You've barely been an Autobot for two orn and you're going on a mission,” Chromedome said. Accusation drip from his voice and oozed in his field.

 

“You may speak to the Prime if you have concerns with my deployment,” Prowl countered, coolly. As he always had, he responded to Chromedome's hot temper with simple, clean logic. At the brightening of the Tagonian's visor, Prowl knew his former partner remembered how this would inevitably go.

 

“ You haven't changed,” the Tagonian sneered.

 

“Nor have you,” the tactician replied. Their conversation, no argument, was drawing curious optics. Prowl felt his plating heat. There was nothing he loathed more than public humiliation. He was not going to be drawn into another pointless fight,least off all when there was an audience. “I do not need to explain my presence or my purposes to you, Chromedome. I see no value in continuing this conversation, now or in the future.”

 

“Just brushing me off as always,” Chromedome grumbled. Prowl turned away, pointedly ignoring the small audience that had accumulated. He paused for a nanoklik before looking over his shoulder.

 

“You were the one to walk away, as I recall. More than once, in fact.”

 

Prowl transformed, and drove off, leaving Chromedome in his dust.  Why was it his former partner felt entitled to feel so much a nimosity towards him?  He may have been cold and uncompromising but Chromedome was impatient and hot helmed.  It had been Tumbler, and he had still been Tumbler then, that had left, left the Enforcers, left  _ him _ . Being cast aside had hardly come as a shock to Prowl,  his own procreators had been unable to cope with the sight of him. Nonetheless, the betrayal of his  only serious  lover had stung more than he would ever care to admit ,  the blow to his pride had been small by comparison.

 

When Prowl had been floundering after Smokescreen's conception and emergence, Chromedome's return had been a beacon of hope. The anger the Tagonian had unleashed when informed that Prowl had budded had been unexpected. Though he had not called the Praxian a slutbot in so many glyphs, the implications had hung thick in in the air. Their relationship had not rekindled, not that time, but their partnership within the Enforcers had, even that had not survived the installation of the ATS. Chromedome had advocated for mnemosurgery as a treatment for Prowl's suddenly worsening glitch but the Praxian had known better. He had been on the sharp end of those needles before, and they had done no good.

 

As the tactician  drove for his hotel room,  he wished for a moment that he could  just brin g himself to speed, to let the exhilaration of the high speeds purge his emotions. It did not matter, however that  this was Iacon,  and not Praxis , an d that he was an Autobot,  and  not an Enforcer. Parts of him, the better parts would also be an Enforcer, and as such, Prowl kept to the speed limit.

 

He hoped that Bluestreak would be in the compound, within range of his work station. Prowl wasted no time activating his own when he arrived in his hotel room. In reality, even if Bluestreak complained, the tactician was duty bound to go on this mission but  Prowl hoped  he might have enough time to convinc e  his youngling that it was for the best.

 

“ Originator!” Bluestreak exclaimed brightly. His answer to Prowl's ping had come a full bream after the tactician had  initiated it . 

 

“Hello, Bluestreak,” Prowl replied. The sight of his creation warmed his spark. “How was your mega-cycle?”

 

“Good!” The youngling cheered. “ I won a troph y for shooting at  the school games. ”

 

“Well done,” the originator replied.

 

“ I can't wait to show it to you,” Bluestreak beamed. Guilt  at the sight of his creation's excitement  overshadowed the  tactician's pleasure at seeing his youngling.

 

“I may be delayed returning,” Prowl explained. As he had expected, as he had feared, Bluestreak looked crestfallen. “There is an operation outside of Iacon that the Prime has asked me to assist on.”

 

“The Prime asked you?” The youngling asked. His sad expression brightened considerably. “That's good, isn't it? He's the Prime and he thinks you can help?”

 

“I would say it is a good thing,” the tactician agreed, his fears fading slightly, though the guilt remained. Bluestreak had an almost unnerving ability to find the positive in even the most unpleasant situations. “My leave will begin as soon as I return to Iacon. I will be unable to contact you while I am on the operation, unfortunately.”

 

“That's okay, I'll be fine,” Bluestreak  assured him. He smiled a sweet little smile. “ Smokescreen called the other cycle. It was nice.”

 

“I'm glad you spoke,” Prowl replied. “It is my hope when I return to Praxus that I will be bringing you back to Iacon with  me .”

 

“Me too,” the young Praxian  said. “Be safe, originator.”

 

It was a tactical decision, born from his ATS that had Prowl w a rn only his cousin, and not the Vicomagister, that he would be out of contact for an orn at least.  Crunch was the least favourite of Windbreaker's descendents, which had played a  key part in Prowl's choosing him as Bluestreak's direct guardian.  The older Praxian, several vorns older than Prowl in fact, was not an ambitious mech, happy to serve in the  lower administration of the city, rather than scraping himself some  power or glory. While he and Prowl were not remotely close, Crunch had a good sense of familial duty, hence why he had agreed to watch Bluestreak while Prowl was  away from Praxus.

 

W ith Bluestreak and Crunch dutifully alerted to the change in plans, Prowl collected his workstation, and the remainder of his belongings, and promptly checked out of the hotel. He would have just enough time to deposit these scant belongs in his hab suite, and arrange for the delivery of his furniture to  go forward without his presence. There would no time to recharge, but Prowl was not concerned  with that . His frame managed well on minimal recharge, and irregular refuelling. That was not to say he did not do better with proper rest or proper fuel, but he managed more than adequately without.

 

“Originator,” Smokescreen pinged at his comms. “Where are you?”

 

“My new residence,” Prowl replied, just pulling up at his building. The waterfall and gardens remained as striking and pleasing as they had when the Praxian had first seen them. “ Do you require the  coordinates? ”

 

“Yah,” his creation said. “I want to see you before you go.”

 

P rowl sent Smokescreen the coordinates and the encryption code for his suite before the call terminated. He had anticipated that Smokescreen would learn of his mission from Jazz.  If Prowl were to make a bet, he would wager that his creation was the mech in charge of making their IDs. Smokescreen's less savoury talents could be put to good use in the Special Operations. This knowledge did not provide Prowl much in the way of comfort when he considered the dangers his creation would face. 

 

“I was surprised when Jazz told me you were going with him,” Smokescreen said when he walked into his originator's hab suite. “I didn't think they'd just toss you into the field.”

 

“You are familiar with the details?” Prowl asked. The empty apartment still did not have a single piece of furniture. Originator and creation stood, facing each other, at the centre of the common room. There was tension in the air, in Smokescreen's field but it did not feel to Prowl as though it was being projected on him.

 

“Tread Bolt and Scrounge are missing,” the younger Praxian said. “Probably 'Cons. Ops are low on staff, and really low on specialists so boss mech and you are going to Rodion to see what you can find. Why did you agree?”

 

“ The Prime requested my assistance,” the tactician explained. “I respected his reasoning.”

 

“Got to prove yourself to the Prime?” Smokescreen asked. “What happens to Bluestreak if something happens to you?”

 

“Crunch is his acting guardian at the moment,” Prowl replied. “In my will I have listed he and you as co-guardians.”

 

“Oh,” the gambler stuttered, clearly surprised.

 

“You are his brother,”  the originator said. “You are also young. I thought co-guardianship would be for the best.”

 

“Wow,” Smokescreen dimmed his optics as he murmured. “That's... not bad. I'd rather not... You know.”

 

“ Yes,” Prowl replied. “I spoke to the Prime. He offered to speak with the Justices on my and Bluestreak's behalf.”

 

“Good,” the creation  said,  raising his helm,  returning his optics to Prowls. He frowned for a nanoklik before reaching into his subspace, retrieving a cube.  “Drink this. I'm betting you've been too busy to think to refuel.”

 

“Thank you, Smokescreen,” Prowl said, and he took the proffered cube. “Bluestreak told me you two spoke.”

 

“I'm glad I listened to you,” Smokescreen replied. “I'll keep tabs on him while you're gone; he'd probably like that, right?”

 

“As would I,” the tactician agreed.  Smokescreen cleared his throat and Prowl caught his raised brow ridge. He looked down at the cube still sitting full in his servos.

 

“You still forget,” the gambler  said. His  tone was almost fond, and the elder Praxian's  spark clenched at the sound of it . “I'm still amazed you  remember ed to feed us.”

 

“I paid others to remember,” Prowl admitted, he took a sip of his cube. It was sour, the Praxian noted with surprise, as he preferred it. “Thank you for this.”

 

“You're welcome,” Smokescreen said.  He raised an optic ridge as his procreator. “Why don't you still have alarms going off telling you you're low?”

 

“I found the alarms distracting and muted them,” the originator explained. Smokescreen laughed.

 

“That's the point of alarms,” he  exclaimed, mildly exasperated .  Prowl did not reply, other than to sip from his cube. Smokescreen shook his helm and looked out the window. “You chose a nice place.”

 

“I thought so as well,” Prowl replied. He finished the cube, but made no move to dispose of it.

 

“Just don't get slagged,” Smokescreen ordered.  Turning to face his originator,  handsome faceplates tight with worry . “And don't get my boss slagged either.”

 

***

 

T he base was quiet under the dark skies. Those Autobots working the fourth shift did not wander the base over much, out of respect for their sleeping comrades.  Vanguards patrolled the ground in silence, as Security watched from the control room. No one approached the single mechanism as he waited to the sight of the runway. You might have thought he was a statue; he did not so much as fidget as he waited.

 

Jazz looked at the IDs his apprentice had made. Blue. He was not sure what colour, what shade he had been expecting but the rich colours came as distinct surprise. Compared to the Enforcer's previous monochrome paint job, Prowl's current look was almost flashy. There was no mistaking the familial relationship between he and Smokescreen now.

 

“Guess you're where Smokey gets his looks,” Jazz said, after he came to stand next to his Praxian partner.

 

“Smokescreen's original colours were not dissimilar to my own,” Prowl  replied.

 

“ 'N your youngling?” The saboteur asked. 

 

“Predominantly grey,” said the Praxian. He was not volunteering anything about himself, but at Prowl was bothering to answer him.

 

“I've gotten the vibe that you ain't a chatty mech,” Jazz replied. “'N I can dig it. Me, I like a good conversation, so 'm givin' you a pass. As long as it ain't about the mission, ignore me all you like. Just to keep things friendly, got any taboos? Anythin' I outta keep my olfactoy ridge out of?”

 

“You are my creation's superior officer, and mine for the time being,” Prowl said. “I will not discuss my personal relationship with Smokescreen.”

 

“That's it?” The Polihexian asked.

 

“That is all,  sir ,” the tactician replied.

 

Had Prowl been aware of Jazz's conversation with Chromedome, Jazz suspected that relationship  too would  be  a taboo subject,  e specially since whispers of a spat between them at the foot of the palace steps was circulating the base. Chromedome had not suggested that they were lovers, but the tidbits Jazz had caught from witnesses suggest it had been more than a business relationship.  What either mech had seen in the other, Jazz could not begin to guess. The Tagonian was a moody slagger, and Prowl was...  he was still trying to figure that mech out. He did not seem like the time to appreciate moodiness in any case.

 

Since Jazz was not out to antagonize the mech, a least not while out in the field, he filed this too away under do not ask. These might have been the biggest questions circling in the operative's processor, but Jazz would survive without those answers. Was it his Praxian upbringing, his glitch, or his personality that made Prowl so aloof. Even without a detectable EMF, the mech had an uninviting aura to him. Actually, it could have been that the lack of electromagnetic communication that made the mech so unnerving the majority of mechanisms. 

 

Every mech had tells, subtle or obvious, and Prowl would have them too,  even without an EMF. With any luck, Jazz would pick up on them quickly enough.  He resisted the urge to rub his olfactory ridge.  It had been a while since he had spent any significant time without his visor.  They were hardly an oddity amongst transformers but Jazz had elected to start out the mission with his visor stored and his blue optics unmasked.  They did not stand out,  his optics,  in any spectacular way. The red and silver paint job he had gone with was not memorable either, precisely why he had chosen it. 

 

“ We're gonna got straight to my bots digs when we hit the ground in Rodion,” Jazz said. “Outta be early enough that we can get into the apartment unnoticed. “ How are you at workin' low on recharge?”

 

“ It will not be an issue,  sir ,” Prowl replied. “It is, in fact, vital that I see the scene as soon as possible, before it can be compromised.”

 

“ Glad we're on the same  page,” the Polihexian said. “'N enough with the “sirs”, I ain't big on rank, 'n I'm pretty sure when this is all over we'll be “equal” anyways.”

 

“As you wish,” the tactician replied.

 

No question, the mech was a master conversationalist.  With anyone else, Jazz would have passed this off as a character quirk, and hardly an uncommon one, but because of what he knew of Prowl, and Prowl's systems, Jazz found himself asking it it was the Praxian's personality, or those tactical systems of his that made him this way? And what about that glitch?  It was an unmistakeable  vulnerability, one Jazz had difficulty getting over. This mech might have been his missing mechs' best shot, but if he crashed and burnt they would both be fragged.

 

“ What do I do if you glitch ?” Jazz asked. 

 

“I recover from crashes without intervention,” Prowl replied. “Medics can speed up the process, when they feel it is advisable. Otherwise my self-repair systems perform their function effectively. That said, in most cases I can prevent a crash, as you saw.”

 

“ Gotta tell you that didn't look  much  like anythin' was prevented, ”  t he saboteur  said. 

 

“ I remained online, and mobile,” the Praxian replied. “Had I crashed, I would have been offline for a minimum of three joors.”

 

“ Three joors,” Jazz repeated, as he vented. “'N this has  _ never  _ happened on an Enforcer excerise?”

 

“My glitch is in my emotional cortex,” Prowl replied. “My tactical systems automatically overrule this cortex. Utilized a peak power, it renders my emotions largely muted.”

 

“To come back 'n bite you when it's all over,” the Polihexian guessed, aloud. Prowl gave him a seemingly blank, sidelong look. Seemingly blank, except that the Polihexian was certain that he had caught the other mech by surprise.

 

“ That can occasionally be a side effect ,”  the tactician admitt ed,  before smoothing asking: “ You are not going to suggest that you never have memory purges as a result of your work ?”

 

“Fair 'nough,” replied the Polihexian, inclining his helm. It was quite a good counter argument, he had to admit. Jazz paused, tilting his helm further to the side, and said: “Our ride's on the approach. In a few joors we'll be in Rodion.”

 

***

 

It was plainly obvious that the Special Operations Commander remained dubious of Prowl's presence on _his_ mission. His doubts, or rather the source of them, was the same as those the Enforcers had held, those medics, instructors and his own kin had all held. The fact that Prowl had answered these doubts on a near constant basis for his entire life did not make answering them yet again any less frustrating.

 

At this point he had a millenia  long record of outstanding service. He was a brilliant tactician, it was a simple matter of fact. But i t was not the fact that he had no experience in espionage that brought the most doubt to Jazz's processor,  as it should have been ; it was, as it  had always b e e n , his glitched processor. Prowl wondered if he would ever stop needing to prove his skill, his value, his reliability.  If ever a mechanism, a normal mechanism, appeared with a record matching his, the Praxian knew he would be gently shown the door. His service record with the Enforcers might have saved his career there, but the Autobots had no reason yet to offer him any loyalty.

 

There was no denying it, Prowl was annoyed. Perhaps, it was illogical to feel so insulted but his encounter with Chromedome, though brief, had brought up those same self-doubts that had followed him throughout his early vorns. He had not, despite what Prowl had told himself for stellar-cycles, rid himself of self-consciousness. Rather than face the doubts helm on, the tactician fed more power to his ATS, and the doubts faded, along with hims emotional cortex, into a quiet hum in the back of his processor. His record, both as an investigator, and as a PETU tactician was excellent, those commendations, boxed up and gathering dust in Praxus, had been earned, even if they had always been handed to him with contempt and duress. Prowl had been a good Enforcer, and he would be a good Autobot, and they would see it.

 

Prowl wondered if Jazz was in recharge. The Polihexian's optics were offline, but that meant nothing. Mechanisms often turned off their optics in order to think free of visual distractions. It would have been logical to recharge, even for the short duration of the flight. It took too much effort for the Praxian to enter recharge for Prowl to bother making such an attempt. He also did not bother to disable his optics as he worked with his ATS to prepare as many strategies as possible for the dangers that lay ahead. This was the secret to the former Enforcer's success as a tactician. While Prowl was skilled at strategizing as events unfolded in front, or around him, his biggest strength lay in the thousands of strategies saved in his battle computer, to be retrieved and amended when the time came to use them.

 

Not all of the strategies stored in the seemingly limitless databanks of his battle computer were went for use in combat or Enforcer operations. Many of the tactics Prowl had formulated over the vorns were far more personal, these were the strategies with the least success rate. They consisted of how he ought to speak to Smokescreen, Windbreaker, Chromedome, etc, or what he ought to do to please/help/pacify them. Ultimately these tactics were rarely successful because of the level of emotional output required to utilize them. The moment he reduced his ATS to the background, his emotions flared up and out of control. Even with his ATS running, if his emotional cortex and tactical systems were in powerful agreement on anything, crashes were all but inevitable.

 

From the early vorns of his life, Prowl had been genuinely uneasy, even afraid of his own emotions. Those stellar-cycles in the Institute had only magnified his unease. Being committed to the retched place again was the tactician single greatest fear. Installing the ATS had been almost singularly motivated by this fear, and since its instillation his ATS had become something of a crutch. To a degree it was cowardice. Jazz had been correct when he had guess that Prowl often faced emotional collapse when his ATS receded after a gruelling operation, this would be when he suffered the most crashes. These, however only ever occurred in private, and so the Praxian accepted them as an unpleasant but acceptable side effect.

 

“It's dawned on me that'cha only got range weapons,” Jazz said, his optics lit up as he spoke. They were eerily bright, a hint towards their sensitivity, and preceptiveness. They would not miss any stumble, or any sign of weakness. Prowl vowed to make none. “So... what martial art did you study?”

 

“Diffusion,” Prowl replied, almost grateful to be drawn from his thoughts.

 

“Mastered it, I bet,” the Polihexian guessed.

 

“Yes,” the tactician confirmed. How had he known? His logic processor all but begged to know, and Prowl could not resist asking: “What made you surmise I practice any art, let alone have mastered it?”

 

“Figured you wouldn't stop practicin' until you had it perfect,” Jazz replied with a shrug. “When I was about to jump you back at the base, you reminded me of an old master I ran into as a younglin'. You loosened up, but you didn't go straight into any position. You wanted to be ready for me, but you didn't want me to guess you were trained.”

 

“Perceptive,” Prowl said.

 

“In the job description,” the saboteur replied, with a guileless air. His expression turned contemplative and he cocked his helm as he seemed to think out loud: “Smokey's a streetfighter. Why don't he have any trainin'?”

 

Both mechs were silent for a klik.

 

“Sorry,” Jazz apologized, with a shaking his helm. “Off limits... my glossa can think faster than my processor.”

 

“Smokescreen had no desire to learn a martial art,” the Praxian explained. He was within his rights to balk at the question but answered nonetheless. “I did not force the matter. He learned how to fight from his progenitor.”

 

“I can see that,” the Polihexian replied. “Smokey's got lots of energy but his focus ain't always great.”

 

“An accurate description,” Prowl said.

 

Though his emotional cortex was repressed as his tactical systems ran on full, Prowl was not entirely free of emotion. His spark was unaffected by his upper processors, including his ATS. The source of raw emotion in all Cybertronians, the twinges, flares and shudders of a mechanisms spark in response to an emotional setting were translated by the emotional cortex as positive or negative stimuli. Even without this translation, Prowl interpreted the flare of his spark as anxiety. Just eluding to Barricade brought unpleasant sensations in his spark, like phantom pains.

 

“Change of subject,” Jazz proclaimed, both servos raised. “What do you need me to do when we're get to the apartment?”

 

“Stick to the wall,” the tactician replied. It was a good question, one he had not really considered. At no point in his Enforcer career had he ever had an untrained investigator at his scene with him. “Any careless step could destroy evidence and contaminate the scene. When I have analyzed the scene, you may perform any searches you desire.”

 

“I can dig it,” the saboteur agreed. “Any 'Cons turn up, slaggin' them, 'n keepin' our platin' intact takes priority.”

 

“Agreed,” Prowl said, and the silence they fell into was almost companionable.

 

***

 

The first streaks of light glowed on the horizon as Shaula, the star Cybertron had orbited for all of Jazz's memory, began to rise. Dawn was still joors away, and all around the Transportation Hub, Rodion recharged. As the two Autobots drove down the largely empty streets, the saboteur took note of the city's physical state. Rodion was in a greater state of disrepair than the city's leadership had ever let on to Optimus. Builder drones worked feverishly to patch worn streets and to paint cracked and rusted facades of the buildings along Rodion's main artery, racing against time. In stark contrast to the tired city centre, the Rodion Heights off in the distance, shined like polished gems. As was so often the case throughout Cybertron, as the rich of Rodion got richer, the poor got scrapped.

 

Jazz had been surprised to see that Prowl's alt mode was woefully out of date. Most Cybertronains changed their alt modes, so long as they could afford to, as technology improved and styles changed. There were, however two groups of mechanisms that did change their alt modes: Functionalists, and those with mode attachment.

 

Prowl did not strike Jazz a mech likely to have a mode attachment, but Functionism was at its roots a religious order, and the tactician did not strike him as a religious mech either. His creation certainly was not a Functionalist; Smokescreen's sleek alt mode was the height of racer fashion. While he had not mentioned his originator following any particular faith, it was possible that this was one of the sources of strife between the two Praxians.

 

The old sergeant, Kup, had a mode attachment. No one had ever been able to convince the retired Wrecker that upgrading was a good idea. As the gnarled old mech had once told Jazz, he knew every quirk and every trick to his alt mode, and he had never seen a mode out there that had tempted him to learn their tricks. When Jazz considered, this might actually have been something Prowl could think too.

 

He would ask later, when Prowl seemed receptive to friendly questioning. Jazz had to make certain he kept on the right side of the line lives of Tread Bolt and Scrounge, if they even lived, counted on him and Prowl working together. There could be no hostility between them. It was lucky that the Praxian had not frosted up, or admonished him already for slipping up with that Smokescreen question. Given the timing of his pseudo question, Prowl may have just been happy to break off from talk of his glitch. If this was the case, expecting it to work twice was unforgivably naive.

 

Once they drove beyond the city centre, the true wear of the city showed. The tenements of the Eastside were more rust than metal. Businesses along the pock marked streets were mostly boarded up; their operators long since moved on to safer and more prosperous grids, or perhaps just “moved” on. Jazz found the dump his mechs had chosen for their base. It looked as terribly as a building could look while still remaining standing.

 

As he had hoped, the sidewalks and streets were quiet and still. Silently, he transformed, glancing over his shoulder to see that Prowl had done the same. There was not need to pick the lock on the building's door, the slumlord had obviously stopped trying to repair the door after it had been kicked down for the umpteenth time. Indents of peds scarred nearly the hole door. Someone had hammered them somewhat flat, but the door was anything but sooth. It was almost a miracle that it even opened. He found the stairs, and started to climb to the tenth floor. The wreck might have had a lift but he was not about to trust it. His partner made no complaints.

 

To his pleasure, Prowl's pedstep were quiet, if not quite as quiet as his own, and they reached the tenth floor without making a racket or falling through a rusted step. They wound down the hall to apartment 1053, keeping optics and audials cranked up. Jazz looked around the hall, and paused to listen. Seeing and hearing that the coast was clear, he tried the door code that Tread Bolt had give him. It worked.

Before his partner could move, Jazz raised a servo, signalling that he was going in first. An energon dagger slid into his servo as his visor fell down over his optics, and he slipped into the room. There was no movement. Thermal imaging showed no bogeys hiding behind any corners, and his horns picked up no sound. Stepping back into the doorway, Jazz gestured for Prowl to join him. Only once the door shut, did Jazz hit the pad by the door and activate the lights. At first glance, even in the dark, he had seen the toppled furniture. In the light, the scene only looked worse. He resisted to urge to rush around the apartment, searching for two greyed frames, and only barely succeeded.

 

Prowl walked into the centre of the room, stepping carefully as he did. He stood, doorwings flared out as wide as they could go, and helm raising and lowering slowly, a mere centimetre at a time as he surveyed the whole room. A bream went by, before Prowl finished his slow rotation. Saying nothing, he crouched several steps from where he had been standing, and ran a digit along a patch of floor. From there he examined a toppled table, and then the wall. Jazz did not take his optics off the mech.

 

“Two warframes attacked one of your operatives in this room,” Prowl proclaimed after nearly a joor's examination. “What colour are your agents?”

 

“Scrounge is straight up gold 'n Treadbolt is blue with gold 'n white,” Jazz replied.

 

“Tread Bolt was the victim then,” the tactician said. He gestured to the wall. “His paint transfers are here and here. His attackers were a blue and black flyer, and a particularly heavy dull green grounder. I suspect the latter is a tank of some sort.”

 

“You can tell all that from paint transfers?” The Polihexian asked, incredulous.

 

“They left pedprints as well,” Prowl explained. “Though he is not particularly tall, the grounders pedsteps are peculiarly heavy. His compatriot is reversed, for his ped size, his steps are lighter than you would expect.”

 

“Is he alive?” Jazz asked.

 

“When he was removed from this room, yes,” the Praxian said, looking over the room again. “There some energon stains where the paint transfers occurred but not enough to signal a grievous injury. He fought, all the way to the door, I think all the way down the hall. What I know for certain is that he was the only one attacked. Scrounge was not here.”

 

“So both my mechs are MIA but only not together,” The saboteur concluded.

 

“They may have been captured separately, perhaps Scourge was taken off the street,” Prowl suggested. “If he was not, then it is curious that he was not in contact with you after Tread Bolt was taken.”

 

“Yah,” Jazz said, frowning darkly. “That is curious.”

 

End Chapter 9

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry this update was so delayed. It was an unpleasant month but the world continues to rotate and the muse muses on.
> 
> I've been entertaining myself playing the new Transformers Earth Wars game on my phone. This is actually what has helped get my muse engaged. If you haven't tried it, give the game a shot.


	10. Chapter 10

“Don't sulk just 'cause _we_ caught the little scrap,” Motomaster sneered, as Barricade scowled across the table at him. The Praxian flared his plating and flicked his doorwings with disdain.

 

“You didn't catch him,” he countered, disgust in his voice. “He was handed to you on a cybertonium platter.”

 

“Details,” the brute said with a grin, puffing himself up. He was a pompous piece of slag.

 

“In any case, _we_ caught the real spy,” Barricade replied, something he had been reminded himself of since the minibot had escaped. “That jet is going to be Megatron's ticket into the spark of Iacon.”

 

“We'll see,” Motormaster snorted.

 

That's right, Barricade smirked. Motormaster was nothing but bolts for processors, and not nearly so slick as he thought he was. Big mech thought himself pretty intimidating too, but he was just another jumped up war-frame so far as the Praxian was concerned. Barricade was a combat-class Praxian, and heavily armoured for his frametype, but compared to a Kaonite or a Tarnian warframe, he might as well not have been wearing armour at all. Mechanisms like “the Road King” thought all Praxians were dainty, fragile things, unable to survive a fight with real “mechs”. Then again, mech like Motormaster thought servo to servo was the come all and be all of fighting. Idiot. As the smirk on Barricade's faceplates grew, Motormaster lost his processor.

 

“You wanna fight?!” The black convoy snarled, toppling the table between them. He gave Barricade a sadistic grin as the Praxian stepped back to avoid getting flattened by the flying table. That grin vanished a nanoklik later when Barricade drew his blaster, and aimed at the larger mech's faceplates. The laser sight from his plasma blaster shone neatly between Motormaster's optics.

 

“Just an overgrown scraplet,” Barricade chastised, contempt dripping from ever glyph. His aim was perfectly level. Both his and Motormaster's teams backed up the walll they did not dare interfere. All of them could all see who the better mech was, and the disgraced Enforcer basked in the knowledge of his superiority.

 

“I'll outta rip those doorwings right off your back!” Motormaster growled.

 

“You'd have to reach me first,” the Praxian countered, a smirk pulling half of his mouth. “I'd have a hole right through your central processor before you could take a step. Face it, Motormaster, you don't bring fists to a gun fight, not if you don't want to be smoking trash on the floor.”

 

He could see the big mech's plating flare and EMF promised death, but Motormaster did not so much as flex in Barricade's direction. Good. Megatron might  get  i rritated with  Barricade if  he turned  “the Road King”  into a bloody ruin.  Still, if Motormaster even squinted at him funny,  the for PETU Enforcer would not hesitate to take him out.  Comfortable that his point had been made, the Praxian lowered his weapon.

 

“Get back to your sparking sitting,” he ordered. “Maybe if you say please, they'll share their rust sticks with you.”

 

It was only a little disappointing when Motormaster obeyed. The brute's optics promised death, but they would see about that. Barricade looked forward to their next encounter. He would show Megatron who ought to have been commander over this mission, and it was not Motormaster. The convoy's team shuffled out behind him, helms low, and avoiding all optic contact with Barricade and _his_ team. Blackout secured the door behind their guests. Only then did he give Barricade a questioning look. 

 

“Was that really smart?” He asked. “You just made an enemy for life... or death.”

 

“Mechs that like big and stupid can't sneak up on me,” Barricade replied, dismissing flyer's concerns. “If he even looks at me wrong, I'll kneecap him, and that'll be the end of it.”

 

“If you say so,” Blackout said.

 

“Don't be so jumpy,” Brawl scolded. “That was great! Big mouth was shaking his bolts out! Shoulda done it myself ages ago.”

 

“That's the thing about Combiners,” the Praxian said, sitting back in his favourite chair and picking up the engex abandoned on the table. “Their basically gutless unless their combined. No better than a minibot.”

 

***

 

Further searhing of the  hab suite found nothing of value to Jazz. Neither mech had left a sign or a signal behind. He knew the 'Cons had Tread Bolt, and he knew that Scrounge was MIA, but that did not get him anywhere.  There was nothing  there to point him in any particular direction as to where the 'Cons were holding Tread Bolt, or what exactly they were up to. The helplessness  Jazz felt made  his temper flare. His mechs' lives were at stake, and he had absolutely no idea where to find them.

 

Jazz lead the way out of the wrecked unit, and out of the building. The skies were a little lighter, but the streets was still empty. Mega-cycles may have passed there was still the chance that some shred of evidence from Scourge might be laying out on the street. Rather than argue with the likely futility of such a search, Prowl went right back into investigator mode.

 

It was as though  Jazz  was not even there.  The saboteur  stood a few meters away from  Prowl as he crouched down and e xamined the sidewalk.  While his partner searched for clues,  the  Jazz stood guard, watching for any early risers.  He heard  the other mech  rise and move into the alley,  next to the building.  Keeping one optic and audial horn on the street, Jazz followed. There was no question, something had caught the former Praefectus Vigilum's attention. 

 

“What'd you find?” Jazz asked. Prowl did not answer, not immediately. He was totally focused on whatever clue he had spotted. The alley stunk of stale energon and spoiled oil but Prowl did not seem to notice, or at least he did not care. When the Praxian did finally answer, kliks had passed.

 

“Scrounge hid here,” he said, his optics stayed on the rusted metal of the wall as he outlined the area with his digit for Jazz's sake. When the Polihexian followed Prowl's digit, he saw small, but plentiful paint transfers. They almost perfectly blended in to the rust staining the wall. “He pushed his frame back against the wall with enough force to make this transfer. I cannot say for certain if he was taken from here, or if he ran, the scene is too contaminated.”

 

“So either he's on the run, 'n he can't call me for some reason,” Jazz theorized. “Or he's been captured.”

 

“I predict that he has been captured,” Prowl replied. When he stood, he brushed debris from his leg plating. “If his comms had merely been blocked, surely he would have to a data-net cafe. The fact that he has not been in contact does not bode well for his safety.”

 

“Have to agree with you,” the Polihexian said. His next glyphs caught on his glossa as his audial horns caught voices approaching. Thinking quickly, Jazz pushed Prowl against the wall, gripping his arms with near denting force. Before the Diffusion Master could launch a counter attack, he whispered, urgently: “Follow my lead!”

 

“Thought I 'eard somethin' o're 'ere,” a rough voice said. Under the Polihexian's digits, Prowl's cables drew taunt. He was ready to attack, but Jazz was not the target. Releasing the other mech's arms, he curled his left servo into a fist beside the Praxian's helm, and rested the other on his shoulder. His own frame was coiled like a spring, ready to leap into action.

 

“Where?” Another, considerably less gravelly, voice asked.

 

“There!” The first mech exclaimed. From the corner of his optic, Jazz saw his shadow fill the alley's entrance. Before the glyph had even be fully formed, Jazz was in motion. He leaned his helm in and kissed Prowl hard.

 

“Just a couple of love birds,” the second mech replied, as his shadow joined his companions. Exasperation was clear in his voice. “Will you get a move on? I'm not going to be late to the factory again because of you!”

 

“Love birds?” The first mech sneered with disgust as the shadows moved away. His voice faded as they walked on. “More like a prostibot...”

 

N either Autobot moved,  no even to break the kiss . Vaguely,  Jazz was surprised to find the Praxian's lip plates to be warm and malleable, nothing like the  stiff, cold metal he might have imagined . Only after half a bream passed did the saboteur take a step back. Prowl pushed off the wall  immediately after, noticeably flexing his doorwings. A flash of guilt  went through Jazz's processor.

 

“Sorry,” he said, as he started to circle Prowl to check for any damage to the Praxian's doorwings. “You alright?”

 

“I am unharmed,” Prowl stated, without inflection. His doorwings dipped, perhaps a centimetre, before returning to their standard positions. “That was quick thinking.”

 

“Thanks, mech,” Jazz replied. Working with Smokescreen had given him the opportunity to learn a little of the Praxian doorwing dialect. He recognized the dip as a sort of nod of approval. That was something, at least. “Let's book it to our digs, before we get noticed again.”

 

“That would be wise,” the Praxian replied. Jazz waited for his partner to step out of the alley and to transform before he took his own alt mode. Not willing to take his partner as his word, he took a kick look at Prowl's back. There were some superficial scraps to the finish along the Praxian's plating and doorwings, but nothing really worrying. It was a relief. The fact that he was fretting like a brooding originator was almost funny. Prowl was a trained Enforcer, a little shove against a wall was not going to do him any damage.

 

Where Tread Bolt and Scrounge had made there base in the slums, Jazz elected to use the very hotel Optimus was expected to stay in for the festival for theirs. His current look would not do for this, and Jazz pulled off onto an empty side street for a quick “wardrobe” change. Prowl turned with him, and blocked the street, blocking any curious optics. It was not just a matter of changing his paint, Jazz changed his very alt-mode. His strong, smooth curves were replaced distinctly sharp spoilers, and sweeping lines. This was an alt mode that garnered second and third glances. It had been thousands of years since Jazz had taken on this disguise.

 

“'M checkin' in as Folgore,” Jazz explained via close-circuit comm. 

 

“I recognize the designation,” Prowl said, over the same comm. “Were you a musician before you enlisted.”

 

“Sorta,” the Polihexian replied. “It was always a cover. Wherever Folgore turned up, somethin' broke, or some mech died. I was Ops for Polihex before I joined the Autobots. Haven't used Folgore since I defected.”

 

“This would explain “your” sudden disappearance,” the tactician surmised. “If you even elude that you might like to launch a comeback tour out of Rodion, after so much time has past, the city will be groveling at your peds. You will have access to the highest levels of Rodion.”

 

“You got it,” Jazz replied. “Keep your current 'mode for now. Folgare always had a... mech at arm's reach.”

 

“Affirmative,” Prowl agreed.

 

Jazz contemplated the subtext of that last suggestion, even as he spoke it. It was difficult to pose as lovers with another mechanism. Both operatives had to be excellent actor, and whether the difficulty was keeping professional or finding chemistry, there was usually a problem. The saboteur doubted that his Praxian partner could act any different than he did. Prowl was rigid and stern, not lover material. Then again, Folgore was an extravagant, and flamboyant mech, and it was almost in his style to have the strong, silent type for a play thing.  He did not need to explain the Praxian's place, in any case. Guard, assistant, lover, over the vorns, it had always been assumed, whatever might have been said to the contrary, that Folgare's ever changing companions had been his lovers.

 

T he various operatives that had filled the role of guard/assistant/lover in stellar-cycles  past were all long greyed.  Some  of them  had been Jazz's dearest friends, mechs he had trained with from his earliest vorns. Much like Mirage and Hound, the Polihexian saboteur had emerged to be an operative,  his procreators had been members of the Fellowship, a guild of assassin/spies that had served Polihex's lord under the guise of being a religious order for  generations .  His friends had been the sons  of other Fellowship members, and n ot one  of them  still lived. When the Decepticons had be gun their rebellion, Straxus had see n credits flash before his optics,  and the Lord of Polihex had been quick to sell both his operatives' skills but often his operatives themselves to Megatron. 

 

While they might have been assassins as often, if not more often than they had been spies, the Fellowship's members had balked at the idea of serving Megatron, and of there members more or less being sold as weapon/slaves. The entire governing body had been massacred for their defiance of the Lord of Polihex's orders. They had not gone quietly, and the majority of the Fellowship's operatives had died defending their leaders and their community.

J azz would have been amongst the greyed except that he had been in Kalis, “performing”.  It  had been Folgare's final performance, the operative's final assassination in the name of Straxus.  His teammate had return  when news had reached them  of the slaughter.  Artfire had been murder to o ,  after failing to avenge his  Amica Endura, Jazz's own brother, Ricochet . 

 

While the Fellowship had been sponsored by the Lord of Polihex, the governing council  had been zealously independent, and had never given him intimate details about their membership, including long term aliases. There was no reason to fear that Straxus would recognize Folgare as one of his former operatives.  That was not the source of hesitation and loathing  Jazz felt as he dawned this once familiar disguise.  The song had been sucked from his spark when Straxus had turned on the  Fellowship .  Apart from the  cithara Ric had given him for an Emergence Cycle gift when they had been mechlings, the saboteur had destroyed every one of his instruments.  Having planned on using Folgare as a cover, Jazz had brought that very cithara along. He just hoped he did not get cornered into playing it.

 

“Keep a couple'a steps behind me 'n don't say anythin',” Jazz ordered as they transformed in front of the hotel. “Leave everythin' to me.”

 

***

 

J azz was disturbed by something.  Prowl might have brushed it aside as  the saboteur's  worry for his agents, except that the tension in the mech's frame had only appeared when he had completely shifted his appearance. It had surprised when the operative had changed his alt-mode. Such a change was rarely done casually, as it was often disorienting.  But  Polihexian did not appear  disoriented,  only troubled.  Despite the nagging  questions of his tactical systems,  Prowl refrained from interrogating Jazz.

 

It was intriguing to learn that music he had enjoyed had been performed by this mech, as nor more than a disguise. Prowl thought it was needlessly complicated, and potentially dangerous, to have such a complex undercover persona. There was a genuine risk of fracturing one's processor, not that Jazz seemed in any imminent risk of that. In truth the risk of a mechanism's personality components breaking under strain was not enormously high; Prowl's own fervent sense of self only magnified the risk to him.

 

A s Jazz transformed,  there was no further sign of the tension previously evident in his frame.  Like with his alt mode, the Polihexian's armour plating had shifted shape as well.  His  frame is entirely shades of silver, the only exception was narrow  white  optical band that covered the top half of his faceplates. Beyond the colour change, the overall design of his frame had changed.  Broad lines ended in  dangerous-looking spauld rons, and  with  long, narrow audial horns  a s  the c oup de gras . Over all,  the effect was striking, and unforgettable.  As Folgare, Jazz looked like a statue out of the Silver Age. 

 

The Praxian followed as his teammate walked towards the hotel entrance. Jazz had fully transformed into Folgare, right down to the gliding gait and the languid electro magnetic field. Prowl made no attempt to copy the other's walk. Rather than clash, he thought his normal rigid posture and pace matched his “disguise” more than adequately. Folgare had always travelled with one mech close at servo, and stories of his lasciviousness had been tabloid fodder for vorns. Rarely had he toured with the same companion twice. When he had disappeared from the public optic, it had been suggested repeatedly by that the performer had gotten one of his “playthings” with spark, requiring him to settle down like a respectable mech. 

 

There had never been any real evidence of the entertainer's supposed debauchery, which made it less than surprising to learn than those reports had been categorically false. While he had toured Cybertron with a different mech at his side nearly every time, Folgare had not draped himself over them, or them over him. Certainly, there had been plenty of flirtations between the musician and his companions but really, he had flirted with both interviewers and fans as well.  His lascivious persona had been all that was necessary to have Folgare described as a libertine. It had also made excellent tabloid fodder.

 

When Folgare had failed to reappear after several stellar-cycles the tabloids had  moved on from their stories of illicit liaisons and bastard sparks, to  suggest that Folgare had been murdered by a jealous lover. That story gained enough attention that  eventually  Enforcers in Polihex had opened a missing mechanisms case.  Of course, the musician had said more than once that he lived abroad, rather than in Polihex, and the Enforcers in his home city had never found so much as a trace of  him.

 

With what Prowl had now learned, it was obvious that these “play things” had been fellow operatives.  T he question now was, what had happened to them? If they  had  still served Polihex, Jazz would never have risked dawning this disguise. There was no denying that his home city was thoroughly under Decepticon influence, whatever claims of neutrality Lord Straxus might  extoll. A quick analysis of what he had learned, and Prowl concluded that those operatives must of be in the Well.

 

How close had he been with those fellow operatives? Had the flirting glances been real?  Prowl was only slightly concerned that Jazz might need to make a spectacle of them.  The kiss had been a clever tactic to both shield their faceplates, and to  explain their presence in th at alley. It had also been jarring, more so even than the Polihexian's sudden attack, mostly because it had been unexpectedly  pleasant .  How long, precisely, had it been? A quick calculation warned the tactic i an that he was better off counting the vorns, rather than the stellar-cycles; it was less depressing this way.

 

Prowl dismissed any further thoughts on the kiss or his abysmal personal life. Reality was often stranger than fiction, and he would never have guessed that the Folgare had disappeared to serve the Autobots, that his life had been no more than a clever disguise for a Polihexian spy. It was an intriguing idea, and the tactician resolved to go back over all of Folgare's past tours, to see if he could identify Jazz's actual missions. If nothing else, it would be an interesting way to occupy his ATS for a few mega-cycles.

 

“Maestro!” The pale teal mech exclaimed, as he all but tripped over himself to reach the front counter ahead of his colleagues. “What can I do to assist you this light-cycle?”

 

“I have a reservation under Pantera,” Jazz, speaking as Folgare, purred. He gestured back at Prowl, who silently produced his ID under that designation. 

 

“Ah, yes,” the receptionist said as he tapped at the holo-screen in front of him. “I have you in the Tironium suite. It's a beautiful hab suite, just below the Cybertite suite.”

 

“Is it?” Folgare asked, with a hum of concern. “I hope the guests above us aren't... disruptive.”

 

“Not at all!” The teal mech assured him. “The Cybertite suite is empty as some upgrades on being completed. Really it's just paint now, you won't hear a thing.”

 

“Getting ready for a special guest?” The musician asked, as his check-in was finalized. Prowl watched and listened, more impressed at Jazz's skills than he had expected to be. This mech had no idea he was being interrogated.

 

“Optimus Prime will be invigilating the Festival of Epistemus in a few orns time,” the receptionist explained. He inserted a data slug into a slot on the counter, allowed something to download, and then handed it to Jazz, or rather to Folgare. “We're fortunate that he has decided to stay with us. Now, everything is ready for you, Maestro Folgare. This has the encryption code for your suite on it. Either inserted in the slot of your door panel, or memorize and type in the code, whatever you prefer.”

 

“Thank you for your gracious help,” Folgare said, taking the data slug. The mech all but preened. “Now you understand that I don't want any fuss. I'm here to relax, and I can hardly do that if the press is salivating at the door.”

 

“Of course,” the mech effused. “I will make it my top priority that you aren't disturbed by that... riffraff.”

“Thank you,” the Polihexian replied. “I won't forget your help.”

 

Remaining silent, Prowl followed the other mech to the  elevator.  When Jazz did not speak, he remained silent.  If  the experience operative did not believe it was safe to speak, comm or otherwise, the Praxian would follow his lead. T hey were at their floor in a matter of nanokliks. There were only four suites on the penultimate floor, with the Cybertite suite encompassing the entire floor  above then .  Jazz led the way to their suite, and using the data slug, had them in a moment later. 

 

Still, the saboteur did not speak.  H e looked around the room, contorting into all manner of un fathomable  positions  as he sco u red the room for recording devices .  Just as  Jazz had when Prowl had been searching for clues, the Praxian kept out of the way, allowing the expert to work. When the floor and the furnishings were fully searched,  Jazz looked up at the ceili ng, the light from the ceiling fixture glint ing  off his visor . The tactician followed his gaze,  never expecting the Polihexian to do what he did nex t.

 

Had the ATS not been running a peak power, Prowl suspected he would have crashed, as Jazz very literally climbed up the wall, and onto the ceiling. Stupefied, Prowl watched on as the Polihexian braced his peds against first the wall, and then the ceiling, his servos appearing to adhere to whatever surface the were placed on. Even with his ATS muting his emotional cortex, seeing Jazz crawling on the ceiling still through him through a loop. The tactician was still reordering his processor when Jazz let himself fall. He landed with barely a sound. It occurred to Prowl that this mech's frame was heavily modified.

 

“All clear,” the saboteur declared. “Left one of my own in the light. Anyone open's that door, it'll start recordin' and transmit to me.”

 

“You have an unusual modification,” Prowl said flatly, looking at the Polihexian's servos.

 

“Magnets,” Jazz explained, wriggling his digits. “One of my favourite tricks.”

 

“They will be of use when you attempt to access the Cybertite suite,” the tactician observed. As his ATS absorbed what he had witnessed, Prowl's equilibrium returned.

 

“Gonna use'em to climb the elevator shaft,” the saboteur revealed. He gave Prowl an approving smile. “I thought you'd catch my plan.”

 

“Had you not already intended to, I would have suggested it,” Prowl replied.

 

“Didn't think you'd be shy about your opinions,” Jazz said, and wonder of wonders look of approval remained. The tactician could not help but be pleased by it. Generally when such a sentences was spoken, it was said with contempt. “That's on this dark cycle's agenda. Right now, we got some figurin' to do.”

 

Jazz took a compact work station from his subspace and set it up on the low table in front of the lounge sitting in the Great room of their hab suite. It took a full klik for the saboteur to gain full access to the system; the device was well encrypted. Once he had gained access to the workstation's programs, Jazz projected a street map of Rodion. He marked the location of Tread Bolt's and Scrounge's hab suite and stepped back.

 

“Ain't much to go on, but what do you think?” The Polihexian asked. “Any idea where the 'Cons might be hidin' and where Scrounge mighta run to?”

 

P rowl looked over the map. Periodically, he enlarged individual grids  to get a closer look at their contents. As the kliks passed, he highlighted  one  pecific building,  and finally, a several kilometres in diameter circle, with  the apartment building at the epicentre. No single location screamed at him as the likely hiding place of the Decepticons, but one location did  stand out  the likely destination for a fleeing Autobot agent.

 

“The Eastside Enforcer detachment is here,” Prowl explained, directing his teammate's attention to the highlighted building. “It would have been no trouble from Scrounge to reach it, either in his primary or alt-mode.”

 

“They ain't been vetted,” Jazz said, frowning at that thought.

 

“Trust of Enforcers is ingrained in most mechanisms before they reach their youngling upgrades,” the Praxian replied. “With no ally in the city, it would have been easy for your agent to convince himself that he would be safe there.”

 

“You thinkin' that coulda been a mistake?” The saboteur asked. He canted his helm at Prowl, and the Praxian flicked a doorwing in a Praxian shrug.

 

“It would be too obvious an escape route to be a sound choice,” Prowl said. “He could have been plucked off the street before ever entering the building.”

 

“Or?” Jazz asked.

 

“Or the Decepticons have infiltrated the Rodion Enforcers,” the Praxian replied. “I will visit the detachment next cycle. If it is safe, I will make enquiries.”

 

“Keep your comms open in case things get hot,” the saboteur ordered. “I ain't losing another mech to this fraggin' city.”

 

 

***

 

One of the perks to being a celebrity was the unspoken expectation that places like the Empirium would hold your privacy to the highest priority. Jazz stepped from his and Prowl's suite confident in the knowledge that nothing more than a security drone was monitoring the cameras. Drones had their uses but they were not as observant or as inquisitive as sentient mechanisms, which made them lousy security-bots, at least if you wanted to keep mechanisms like Jazz out. The Polihexian, maintaining his disguise as Folgare, took the elevator down two floors. He could have hacked the elevator on his own floor, but the staff elevator was too open to the hallway, and for what Jazz planned to do, he needed a blind spot. Two floors down, the saboteur stepped from the elevator and rounded the corner.

 

It had only taken the saboteur a joor to re-familiarize himself with the Empirium's layout. Not much had changed since he had first stayed in the hotel, back in early mega-cycles as an operative. Jazz had been reacquainting himself the layout for orns, having selected over the other hotels in the city for Optimus' stay. There should be no surprises.

 

The niche that housed the staff elevator was the perfect spot; with a single loan security camera obscured by a pair of gaudy statutes, the saboteur quickly shifted his plating, completely unscene. This was more or less his normal appearance, save for the all black paint job. Now a shadow, easily missed by the average optic, Jazz turned his attention to hacking the elevator door. While it might have been a nice thought to just ride the elevator to the top floor, there were cameras in every elevator. There were, however no cameras in the elevator shaft itself.

 

The magnets that had impressed Prowl earlier once again came in handy as Jazz jumped through the elevator doors before they shut stubbornly behind him. Catching the cable with one servo, the Polihexian did not look down, but rather up. He was not stranger to the dangers of elevator shafts but this one ought to be safe enough. Given it was the middle of the dark cycle, maintenance crews and staff would not likely be running around the hotel, certainly not the top floors, for fear of disturbing their illustrious guests.

 

Climbing four floors up an elevator cable was far from the most relaxing thing Jazz had ever done on a mission, but it was not nearly the most strenuous. He had climbed far higher, more than once. The last time Jazz had stayed at the Empirium, he had actually ridden on top of the passenger caddy... But never mind that. Hacking the elevator door from the inside took considerably more skill, and considerably more time than it had from the outside, but the saboteur was safely on the ground before too long, but before he swung into the room, Jazz threw a nifty new device he had borrowed from Kup into the room. A pulse lit up the space, and when no one came to investigate, the saboteur followed suit.

 

There was no need to hack any locks now; for all intense and purposes, Jazz was inside the Cybertite suite. The staff elevator led to the “working” kitchen and sitting room were the hab suites private butler and cook would waste away their joors at the beck and call of the esteemed guest. Jazz took his time scanning the first rooms, switching between every setting of his visor as he searched for any recording devices.

 

Unsurprisingly, there were your standard surveillance cameras set up to oversee staff activities, Jazz paid them no mind. The pulse from his static grenade would have temporarily shorted them. Once satisfied that there was nothing nefarious hiding in these “staff” rooms, Jazz approached the door to the main suite. For a hotel, the encryption here was state of the art, considerably stronger, and considerably trickier than what Jazz might have expected. It still had nothing on his own locks, or of those barring access to the most restricted parts of the Autobot base. As he broke the encryption the Polihexian thought back to his forays into Decepticon territories. The locks did not scream 'Con either. Perhaps the hotel had just upped their security measures in anticipation of Optimus' visit. He almost approved.

 

As before, when the door slid open, Jazz toss a grenade in first, insuring no one would observe his presence now, or if the cameras were ever reviewed later. Given the hour, and the fact that the suite was empty, Jazz did not expect any interruptions. Nonetheless, he did not linger, and the saboteur was quick to explore the opulent rooms. There should have been no security cameras in these rooms, and there were not any, not exactly.

 

There were surveillance devices, cleverly hidden ones at that, in every room. When the Autobot agent examined the first audio bug, he found that it was not yet active, and as his search went on, Jazz found that the same was true for all the dozen devices dotting the hab suites rooms. Someone had planted the bugs, and hidden cameras in the brand new furniture, and decorations, but they had not activated them. It was more than a little disappointing. With the bugs offline, there was no way for Jazz to track their signal back to their origin. The Polihexian resisted the urge to crush the bug he held in his servo, and instead returned it to the fixture he had found it on. Should whoever had set up the bugs return to activate them, he or she would not find anything amiss. Unfortunately, that was the best the Jazz could do.

 

No, not quite the best. Jazz took a tiny bug from his own collection and installed underneath, and inside the couch. Identically, on the outside, as a screw, Jazz replaced a screw within the lounge with his bug. To prevent it from being detected, his bug would record but would not transmit. He would have to retrieve it to see if it had picked up anything.

 

Still irritated that he could not do or learn more, Jazz hacked his way back into the elevator shaft and prepared to descend four floors. It was always worse going down than going up. A certain amount of primal fear could not be avoided. Gritting his denta, and servo over servo, Jazz climbed down the cable. He circuits were buzzing, and his spark pulsed in his audial horns. One thing was certain, it would take joors for Jazz wind down enough that he could recharge.

 

End Chapter 10

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am currently working on editing previous chapters, since there are some pretty stupid errors. I'll mark each chapter after it's been edited. No plot bits will change, one missing sentencing will be added to a past chapter but it should not be necessary to reread anything to continue with the story. That said, if you want to, once the edits are complete, it should be a nicer read.


	11. Chapter 11

One of the things Jazz disliked about being an officer was sitting back and waiting. He preferred to be in the field, on site to make split-nanoklik decisions if something went haywire. Sitting in the posh suit, twiddling his thumbs as Prowl set off to make enquiries did not suit him at all. The Enforcers would have had too many questions as to why a random Polihexian was working with a Praxian Enforcer, and so it only made sense for Jazz to stay behind. The waiting game sucked slag. Knowing that his comms were wide open was of little comfort. Rather than drive himself crazy, Jazz did the one thing useful thing he could think of, he opened the second work station he had brought with him, and called home.

 

“Jazz!” Hound exclaimed as his face materialized on the holo-screen. “Good to see you're still in one piece.”

 

“We both are,” Jazz replied. “Everythin' workin' out at base?”

 

“Leo's been a huge help,” the scout explained. Jazz smiled at the use of Smokey's alias. “Not just with department business either. He's pretty could with bitlets too.”

 

“That mech's full of surprises,” the Polihexian said. “Anythin' come up with any of our ops?”

 

“No,” Hound replied. “Intel is coming in pretty steadily, everyone's upped contact like you asked. Goldbug is on the mend too, and he's been coaching the rookie from his sick chair.”

 

“'Perfect,” Jazz said. “It's early for a check-in, but I wanted to keep you up to date. Sky Patrol's been captured for sure, we're still trying to figure out what happened to Lowtech. Haven't a clue where the 'Cons are hidin' out, 'n that's our next step.”

 

“Captured is better that dead, I guess,” the originator said, grim-faced. Though the connection ought had a high level of encryption, both mechs were careful not to reveal too much. Apart from Jazz, they all used alias. His key alias, Meister was not used. It was a rule that “Meister” never showed his faceplates.

 

“Cervo's wicked brilliant,” the sabtoeur replied. He did not think that Prowl would be impressed with his alias. “Makin's of a pro.”

 

“I'll pass that on,” Hound chuckled. “It'll ease his processor.”

 

“Sound's good,” Jazz said. “I'll update you in three mega-cycles. If you don't hear from me, we're where Misterio 'n me first met.”

 

“If you don't call, I'm sending Misterio after you,” the servus frame promised. “Watch yourself.”

 

Where was Mirage? If he was still in Tarn, than he was definitely the closest operative Jazz knew to Rodion. That said, he was not an Autobot operative, and the Polihexian was not altogether positive Mirage could drop whatever mission the Spymaster had handed him to run to his and Prowl's aid. Every time Jazz or Hound had called Mirage up to this point, he had come, and come quickly. Odds were, he would come to Rodion on the first flight if they called him now. But despite what the Towers mech had insisted, Jazz really doubted he could handle the Spymaster if that femme got really enraged.

 

Hound had once described Mirage as a pacifist, an odd description for a spy, but when Jazz thought about it now, there was a ring of truth to it. The Towers mech avoided killing, and even fighting at all, unless his life was in danger. Where Jazz had been, and still was, both a saboteur, an assassin, and a spy, Mirage was a spy, and only a spy, with some rather peculiar hobbies.

 

***

 

Rodion, Late in the Reign of Nominus Prime

 

He had done it. Just as his progenitor had warned, there was a rush flooding his circuits. His target was dead on the floor of the Cybertite suite, as the Fellowship's governing council had ordered. It had been his first assassination. Like any other Fellowship operative, Jazz had been expected to prove himself as a thief, and a spy before he had been given a real mission. It had taken him stellar-cycles not just to earn the responsibility of this mission, it had taken him nearly as many stellar-cycles to build a solid cover. Ric had had the idea that he should tour as a musician, and it had been his brother who had dubbed him Folgare. Their originator had thought it a fussy name for a Polihexian lounge singer, but it had stuck, and now “Folgare” had built a real cult following. He could line up shows anywhere, which meant he could “work” anywhere without suspicion. Really, it was brilliant.

 

All he had to do now was climb back to his floor, and he was set. Ric was waiting for him in the suite, acting as both roady and back up in this mission. One more concert tomorrow and “Folgare” would be back on a shuttle to Polihex. All he had to do now was climb an elevator cable down two kilometres to safety...

 

From far below, Jazz heard a low grating noise, and under his servos, the cable jerked. What the frag? This elevator was supposed to be down for maintenance for joors yet! Panic filled the Polihexian as he flung himself from the cable, magnetizing his servos to the nearest wall. The sound of the elevator was coming closer. Spark racing faster than he could think, Jazz scrambled up to the top of the elevator, and flattened himself to the ceiling, just to the side of the cycling cables. Thank Primus he was at the very top because the elevator car kept coming. To the novice assassin's horror, the elevator stopped at the top floor. He held his ventilations and listened as the elevator door opened.

 

It was strange. Jazz did not hear anyone leave the elevator but that could well have been because his spark was all but buzzing in his audials. Releasing his magnets, Jazz dropped onto the roof of the elevator car. He did not dare climb through the ceiling hatch to the safety of the car. Whoever had taken the elevator to the penthouse was bound to get back on the elevator real quick.

 

The doors opened and closed, and again Jazz did not hear any footsteps. Whoever it was, their ped step were light. A nanoklik later, and the elevator was dropping quickly. Frag, this elevator moved faster than anyone in Polihex! Jazz clung to the elevator car, grateful for his magnets. Whatever adjustments he made to his frame, these magnets were never going anywhere. Several nanoklik after the elevator started its descent, it stopped. Again, the doors opened and closed, with no sound of a mechanism moving. As much as it spooked Jazz, he knew he would have to get into the car sooner or later, where or not he was certain the mechanism had left.

 

He waited, and waited. After a few klik, as the elevator stayed on its current floor, Jazz hacked the encryption on the hatch's lock, and with his spark racing, lifted it a crack. The cab was mercifully empty, and venting in relief, the novice operative dropped into the car. Just as he was reaching to request his floor, one of the buttons lit up as though some mech had pressed it, and the elevator was climbing up again.

 

“What the frag?!” Jazz exclaimed, stumbling back. The next nanoklik, the emergency switch was trigger, and the elevator lurched to a stop inbetween floors. Something was up, Jazz opened the plating on his arms, and his plasma knives slid into his servos.

 

“Put those back,” a disembodied voice ordered.

 

“What the,” the Polihexian balked. “Why the Pit should I listen to you.”

 

“Because you can't see me, and I have a blaster pointed at your spark,” the voice countered. The upper class drawl told Jazz that this was the voice of a Towers mech. But where the Pit was he? Unable to answer that question, and with great hesitation, Jazz hilted his knives, and earned him an hum of approval.

 

“So what now,” Jazz asked, fear making his tone sharp. Whatever happened, he was an operative of the Fellowship, and he would not cower. “You got a blaster, why aren't'cha slaggin' me?”

 

“Well for start, I haven't been ordered to,” the mech replied. Right before Jazz's optics, he appeared. Just has he had warned, the mech had a blaster pointed at Jazz's spark. Like the Polihexian had guessed, his assailant was a noblemech from the Crystal City Towers. Blue and white, and long limbed, his triangular chassis was the hallmark of his frametype. To Jazz's displeasure, he looked amused. “For another, you're hardly a threat to me at the moment.”

 

“Just what are you?” The novice demanded. He did not dare even bristle his plating with irritation, not that there was any hiding it in his voice. No one had ever suggested that _invisible_ mechs might exist.

 

“I am the same as you, to a point,” the Towers mech said. “With stellar-cycles more experience.”

 

“Why aren't you killin' me!?” Jazz demanded again. If he was going to get slagged, he did not need the processor games as an appetizer!

 

“I'm fairly certain I answered that question,” the noblemech replied, an amused edge to his voice. “Listen, youngling, I don't care that you assassinated that son of a scrapheap. If anything, you made my job easier. So, as I see it, I have no real reason to kill you.”

 

“You need a reason?” the Polihexian asked with disbelief.

 

“Of course,” the Towers mech said, with smile. “I collect favours, not lives. The way I see it, you owe me a big one.”

 

***

 

After four dark-cycles of poor to absent recharge, Prowl was beginning to feel badly undercharged. Fuel took some of the edge off, but only some. What the Praxian needed was a good recharge, and this dark-cycle he would have to have it. It simply had not been possible to recharge until Jazz had returned to their hab suite the previous dark cycle. The saboteur had been wired, and once he had shared his discoveries, Prowl had been in the same state. They had worked until first light, trying to figure out how to draw out whomever might have laid those recording devices back to the Cybertite suite.

 

Prowl had managed a few joors of recharge, but that much had been intentional. He had wanted was to rise early enough in order arrive at the Enforcer precinct while it was still reasonably at a good joor. Mid-cycle was one of the busiest times in a precinct, and Prowl had wanted to avoid both the crush of complainants, and then increased number of Enforcers. Still under the guise of Pantera, Prowl left the hotel under the pretence of running errands for Folgare. It was not until he had driven to the eastern edge of the grid, that he found a quiet corner of the street, and changed into his more familiar paint.

 

Instead of the glyphs marking him as Praefectus Vigilum, he wore those marking him as a member of PETU. A low ranking Enforcer would have no excuse to visit a foreign precinct, but a PETU officer could make one. Prowl drove east from the Heights' grid. Each grid was in considerably worse repair, with the Eastside being in the worst state of all. Even in the next grids over, there were alarming signs of poverty. Abandoned, and damaged buildings, mechanisms in varying degrees of disrepair and degradation dotted the streets. The red light grid of Praxus was in considerably better repair than any of these grids, not to diminish the plight of Praxus' poor. That said, to even consider the destitute of his own city-state lucky was eerie.

 

This level of degradation had not happened over a night-cycle, an orn, a quartex, or even a stellar-cycle. It had taken vorns, after vorns of neglect, and incompetence to bring Rodion to this state of disrepair. Picturing the Rodion Heights in his HUD, Prowl decided it could not have been mere incompetence that had brought to outer Rodion to this neglected state. Corruption within of the ruling elite had surely responsible. That corruption was so intrenched that the threat of uprising and a Decepticon invasion had not yet to be enough to stem it.

 

As Prowl drove into the Eastside grid, the attitudes of the mechanisms on the road around him changed. He was given a wide berth, with those driving around him falling back. Those walking, or working the sidewalks, eyed him with suspicion, and even fear. Many mechanisms scurried into the allies and dilapidated buildings, hiding their faceplates as they moved. Prowl considered these new observations. If Scrounge had fled to the Enforcer precinct, perhaps he had been detained, simply for being “low caste”.

 

The Praxian was still ruminating on this theory when he arrived at the Eastside Enforcer Precinct. Putting a halt to this thought process for the moment, Prowl transformed. Standing at the edge of the sidewalk, he spent a klik looking over the outside of the Enforcer building. Compared to the neighbouring buildings, the precinct was in good repair, but only by comparison. Doubler plates that had yet to be painted to match the rest of the building covered much of the first and second level. At one point, the trim of the building had been a bright silver, but that paint had mostly shipped away.

 

If the interior was in better shape than the exterior, it would be a small miracle. With nothing else to see on the street, and a mech's life in the balance, Prowl entered the precinct. Just as he had expected, the inside of the Enforcer Precinct was even more tired and worn than the exterior. Even from the doorway, the Praxian could see the Eastside Enforcers were working with severely out of date equipment. The consoles he could see had been outmoded when Prowl had been in the academy. Half the light fixtures were burned out, and there were signs in the ceiling, and corners of a scraplet infestation. How could Enforcers be expected to perform their functions to the best of their abilities without the tools to do it? It was obscene.

 

“May I help you?” The voice of a mech pulled Prowl's attention away from his observations. Before the Praxian Enforcer could ask about Scrounge, the glyphs caught on his glossa. Eerily bright, but empty optics stared at him. Prowl knew he was being studied. Slowly, he turned his focus to the other Enforcers milling about the precinct. To his horror, he saw the same bright, dead optics on every Enforcer's faceplate.

 

Run.

 

The Eastside Enforcers have been reprogrammed.

 

Run.

 

Likelihood that Enforcers throughout Rodion have suffered the same fate, high.

 

Run. Likelihood that other municipal or governing bodies have been reprogrammed, high.

 

Run.

 

Likely conclusion, Decepticons are attacking Rodion from within by reprogramming their leading citizens.

 

Run. Likely fate of captured Autobot spies, reprogramming.

 

Run. Run. Run. Run.

 

Primus above and below, the Decepticons had mneomosurgeons. Rather than obey his core programming and flee, Prowl walked deeper into the precinct, and stopped again with a short distance from the front desk. He forced an expression of superiority on his faceplates as he looked over the room, and the mechanisms in it. In his processor he pictured the expressions of his great-uncle, of his superiors and colleagues. The smug, contemptuous mask took considerable processor power to raise and to hold, but Prowl persevered.

 

“I am touring Rodion's Enforcer precincts on behalf of Praxian Enforcer Command,” Prowl replied forcing a note of disdain into his voice. “My Commanders are planning to launch a new multi-state tactical team... But you need not concern yourself. It is clear that no Enforcer in _this_ precinct will meet the requirements. Do not bother alerting your chief.”

 

He turned on his heel and marched from the building. Ignoring the self-preservation protocols online, and screaming in his helm, Prowl drove to the Enforcer precinct located in the next grid over. As he had feared, the Enforcers there had the same optics. Though they would speak with emotion, their was none in their optics, and their fields were mostly static, punctuated with bursts of temper. It was terrifying, and sickening. The story was the same at each precinct. He might have wept, might have purged but instead Prowl drove on to Rodion's Enforcer Command. It did not surprise him when he saw the Enforcers entering and exiting the building each bore the hallmark of a reprogrammed mech. The citizens interacting with the Enforcers did not notice, however. As long as the Enforcers spoke with emotion, carried on as normal, the average mechanism would not notice their dead optics.

 

Prowl watched from across the street. He had returned to his previous colour scheme, and had the ID of Pantera close at servo. A Praxian tourist would only garner a brief second glance, perhaps a few questions, but a Praxian Enforcer would garner considerably more attention, and Prowl was not willing to risk an interrogation, or for Praxian Enforcer Command being contacted. Having learned all that he safely could, the tactician turned for the Rodion Heights, and the Empirium. Jazz needed to know what had happened to the Enforcers, and what had likely happened to his agents.

 

***

 

When Jazz returned to Iacon, Hound was genuinely going to be happy to go back to his originator leave. Nonetheless, especially this soon after his flight from Vos, it was nice to have something to distract him. The scout had missed his friends in the Autobots for all those stellar-cycles he had spent in Vos. Though the servus frame had take a particularly long, and rather sudden, leave from the Autobots, his compatriots had welcomed him home with open arms. Hound had thought there would be more suspicion cast in his direction, more scorn, but to his face plate, at least, everyone was welcoming.

 

It was not as though Hound had been walking the base much, of course. There were plenty of Autobots that had enlisted after he had gone to Vos, and plenty others that he had never been really acquainted with. If they had doubts about his presence, they did not speak them in his direction, but then, they may not have noticed that he was back. The Ops team tended to keep to themselves, and for now, everything he needed was in Jazz's office. Sooner or later, he would have the urge to roam, but for now he was happy to hideaway, with Silverbolt never out of his optical range.

 

Smokescreen had been kind enough to borrow a containment berth from... someone, and the young Praxian had set it up within arm's reach of Hound's chair. He had only spent a couple of stellar-cycles in Smokescreen's company, but Hound already liked the mech. There was something infectious about the psych student's humour, and he really was insightful. Hound had a feeling that Jazz's end game was not to have the Praxian as an agent in the field, but rather as a psychological analyst. Even without completing his degree, and medical rotation, the mechling had the makings of a great one.

 

A ping at the door was all the warning Hound had before it opened. Optimus Prime stepped into the room. He was one of the few Autobots to possess an encryption key to Jazz's office, not that it would work if the Special Operations Commander put his office on a lockdown. Hound rose and saluted. The Prime gave him a fond, almost indulgent look, and the scout relaxed.

 

“I hope it hasn't been an imposition on you to fill in for Jazz when you've barely returned to Iacon,” the Prime said.

 

“Not even a bit, sir,” Hound replied. “The team is pretty self-sufficient. I haven't had to do much yet.”

 

“Have you heard from Jazz?” Optimus asked, settling in to the single over-sized chair in the office. It was present specifically with him in mind.

 

“He commed me earlier,” the scout revealed. “They found evidence that our mechs were captured, but not much else. It sounds like the two of them are making a good team.”

 

“I fear for our missing friends comrades but I am gratified to learn Jazz and Prowl are meshing well,” the Prime said.

 

“I don't think either of them likes failing,”Hound replied. “I'm only worried that they won't pull out fast enough if something happens.”

 

“Do you have a plan should the worst happen?” Optimus asked.

 

“Jazz's source...” the servus frame said. “The one who warned him about Rodion. If I lose contact with Jazz, I'll call him in.”

 

“Jazz's source...” The Prime mulled over the information. “Your heres, perhaps?”

 

“Yes,” Hound replied, feeling uneasy with the path the conversation had gone. “Jazz's friend, my friend. He'll help if we need him.”

 

“We can trust him with their lives?” Optimus asked.

 

“I trust him,” the scout said, firmly. The Crystal City was a thorn in the Prime's side. They were the most resistant to change, to real democracy. They turned their olfactory ridges up at both the Decepticons and the Autobots. “He's my brother in every way that matters. I wouldn't be here now, or ever, if he hadn't helped. He'll always help if either me or Jazz needs him.”

 

“Then I will trust him as well,” the Prime replied, and Hound found himself sagging with relief. In the containment berth, Silverbolt chittered, obviously woken by their conversation.

 

“May I see him?” Optimus asked, expression softening.

 

“Of course!” Hound cheered. Like many new originators, he was happy to show off his newling, to trustworthy mechanisms at least. The new originator stood, and lifted Silverbolt from the containment berth, his newling cooed happily in responce. Place in the far large Prime's arms, his little flier almost disappeared.

 

It was no surprise to the originator that Optimus was gentle with Silverbolt. Even on the holo-vids Hound had watched during his life in the Crystal City, the Prime had always seemed to possess a gentle touch with those smaller, and more fragile than he. Silverbolt happily chittered and cooed at the new face, completely unfazed by Optimus' size. Hound wished Mirage would take the time, take the chance to see the Prime in this light. He was more than just a figurehead; more than anything, Optimus was a good mech. There could be no doubt that he was a better mechanism than the Spymaster. The servus frame almost shivered at the thought of the pink femme, and his tank clenched. She may have been Mirage's progenitor, but she had less concern for her creation's well being than Optimus had for Scrounge and Tread Bolt.

 

***

 

The realization that he still needed to run “errands” before he could return to the hotel struck Prowl shortly after he entered the Rodion Heights. He would have preferred to return immediately, and apprise Jazz of what he had seen, but there was no actual urgency. There was nothing that could be done for the Enforcers, not by either of them at least. After having been gone for joors, it would appear odd if Prowl returned with empty servos. In all likelihood, no staff member who make enquiries, even if they noticed. But it might cause gossip, or draw undue attention, and it simply was not worth the risk. Resigned, the tactician stopped at the first grocer he saw.

 

Rather than waste his credit, Prowl elected to purchased an assortment of pre-packaged meals, and solid energon. They would not spoil for a considerable time when stored in his subspace, and if he and Jazz did need to flee, the extra minerals would help keep their systems going. From the grocer, Prowl went to the upscale engex dealer located a block from the hotel, and a collection of boutiques. His purchases were all small but the stack of boxes, all with their expensive brand names embossed on the sides, gave the appearance that he had spent a busy light cycle running errands for “Folgare”. Prowl had only entered the lobby, carrying the largest of his purchases in his servos, when the teal receptionist from the previous cycle approached him.

 

“Do you need any help with that, sir?” He said in a genial tone.

 

“No, that will not be necessary, Prowl replied. What else one might have set for the mech, Prowl could not fault his customer service skills.

 

“If you're sure,” the mech said, almost too warmly.

 

“I am, thank you,” the Praxian replied. He swept his doorwings back, with exaggerated slowness. The gesture was mirrored in Vosian wing-speech, it was a signal of of impatience.

 

“Of course, if Maestro Folgare or yourself need _anything_ at all, be sure to ask for Stallion,” the teal receptionist demurred, as he took a step back. He might not have been familiar with Praxians, but this mech had seen enough flight frames to know that he was being dismissed.

 

“I will be sure to tell the Maestro,” Prowl said. With a short nod, he walked away.

 

Stallion clearly hoped to interface with Folgare. A whisper of irritation escaped Prowl's muted emotional cortex. The idea that this mech might have any plans to seduce Jazz triggered a far greater reaction in the tactician than he would have predicted. Naturally, the Polihexian was not going to endanger their mission by falling into berth with a random mech. Nevertheless, he was genuinely annoyed by Stallion's gall. It was completely irrational to have this emotional response, and Prowl was _not_ going to contemplate the reasoning behind his irritation, absolutely not.

 

Of course, Jazz was attractive. Disguised as Folgare, he was striking, in his classical appearance, he was optic catching, and his appearance was hardly the end of his charms. Jazz was the tactician's polar opposite in many ways, gregarious and warm, instead of aloof and cold. Despite his uneducated accent, the Polihexian was keenly intelligent, the trait Prowl valued and admired most. Primus above and below, he refused to be attracted to Jazz.

 

He had learned from his mistake, repeated mistake, with Chromedome. Prowl was never going to mix intimacy with work. If anything, he shied from intimacy at all. There was no logic in calling it romance, nothing the Praxian did was romantic. But intimacy, on an intrinsic level, Prowl craved it. There were innumerable reasons why becoming involved with Jazz was a terrible idea: he was Smokescreen's superior officer, he was an Autobot officer. Anything between them would be doomed to fail as Prowl was not the type of mech that kept another's interest, if he even sparked it at all. That was, with the exception of Barricade, and the Praxian refused to think about that mech in this instant. None of this mattered, in any case, because Prowl was _not_ attracted to Jazz.

 

The klik it took to reach their floor in the elevator was just enough time for the tactician to reorient his thoughts back to the Enforcers, back to his theories. He knew that his past thought process would reappear, likely at an inconvenient time, but for the time being work overruled any personal introspection. That did not mean the sight of Jazz, rather Folgare, seated on the plush couch did make Prowl's spark twinge. Again, he was not attracted to Jazz; he refused to be attracted to Jazz.

 

“What'd ya find?” Jazz asked when the door was sealed and the lock engaged. “Get the vibe it's bad.”

 

“The Enforcer's have been reprogrammed,” Prowl replied, setting his packages on the table by the door before turning to Jazz.

 

“How'd you figure that out?” The saboteur asked. It was interesting. Though he was guised as Folgare, Jazz was speaking as himself, the result was offputting.

 

“Their optics,” the Praxian explained. He joined Jazz on the sofa, and taking out the workstation the other mech had given him, highlighted the Enforcer precincts he had visited that light cycle. “Reprogrammed mechs have an unmistakeable tell once you are familiar with them. A normal mechanisms optics brighten, and dim in response to emotional feedback. A reprogrammed mechanisms optics are always bright, and at the same time they are empty.”

 

“How'd you learn this?” Jazz asked, frowning and cocked his helm at the tactician.

 

“I spent several stellar-cycles as a youngling in the Institute in Praxus,” Prowl revealed. Even with his ATS at full power, the prickle of shame he felt was strong enough that his doorwings droop noticeably. “I am familiar with the look.”

 

“You were reprogrammed?” The Polihexian asked, visor glowing all the bright, his EMF flared with horror.

 

“Not then,” the tactician replied, and in an act of self-consciousness, he averted his optics, and stared at the floor. “But vorns before, when I was a sparkling.”

 

***

 

End Chapter 11.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is a shorter chapter, 4000 plus words instead of 5000, but it felt right to end it here. We're leading into some of my favourite pieces of this story so stay tuned. Thanks for reading!


	12. Chapter 12

“A sparkling?” Jazz repeated the glyphs, unable to comprehend the idea that any mneomosurgeon would perform a reprogramming on a sparkling, let alone that any procreators would ask for it to be done. In the first blatant act of emotion the Polihexian had witnessed from Prowl, the other mech blatantly refused to make optic contact. “Holy Primus. Your procreators... They asked for it?”

 

“I emerged with my glitch,” Prowl said, optics on the floor. His doorwings rose only to fall again. The image mirrored that of Smokescreen when he had revealed his brother's near death at that party. “My procreators sought to fix me. The medics they spoke to all said that glitches were manageable, but not curable. This was not an acceptable answer to my procreators, and they sought out a mnemosurgeon who had received significant press in Praxus due to his claims that all processor flaws could be fixed through mnemosurgery. The surgeon hesitated, due to my age, but in the end he performed the procedure.”

 

“You still have the glitch,” the saboteur observed, voice quiet, and careful. Had this been any other mech, literally any other mech or femme, and Jazz would have been pulling them into a tight hug, and holding them until the shame and pain faded, but Prowl was like no other mech, and Jazz was not even sure touching him would be appreciated.

 

“The medics were correct, glitches can be managed but they cannot be cured,” the Praxian replied. “They are routed in one system but nearly always involve other systems. The relay between my emotional cortex and my logic processor is weak, and my coolant systems are impacted as well. Given my emotional cortex's propensity with overheating, these faulty systems all contribute to my glitch. I am told the mneomosurgeon claimed to have improved my glitch by only “tweaking” my processor rather than performing a full reprogramming. He insisted that with repeated treatments he might cure me.”

 

“But...” Jazz asked as Prowl stalled.

 

“My procreator's claimed that my personality had changed,” Prowl said. “They felt, for all intents and purposes, I had been reprogramming. I do not know how true this was, I was _young_ , having barely developed language. The mnemosurgeon dismissed their claims, arguing instead that they were paranoid. They threatened a malpractice suit. Angered by their dismissal of his skills, through the Institute's attorneys, the fact that I had emerged glitched, and that I had been reprogrammed at the request of my procreators was leaked to the media. It was a huge scandal. That I had emerged glitched cast scorn on my House, that my procreators had asked a mnemosurgeon to work on me, a mere second tier sparkling, cast scorn on them. They went into exile in the remote border regions of Praxus.”

 

“And they left you behind,” the Polihexian filled in the gaps. “Prowl, who raised you?”

 

“My care was left to employees of the Vicomagister,” the tactician explained. “As head of our House, he was legally required to care for me. I was left in my procreators' ziggurat, segregated from the other sparklings and younglings of House Ordo for fear that my presence would somehow damage them. Rather that risk me glitching in front of classmates, I was home schooled. At one point one of my caretakers came up with the idea to bring sparklings from outside of House Ordo to interact with me, thinking my exclusion was damaging. Instead, these encounters were deemed detrimental to my health. The antics of other sparklings often caused me to glitch, leading to the other Houses to whisper amongst themselves of my affliction. It was no longer desirable to take a member of our House as Conjunx Endura, not even to the lesser houses. Vicomagister Windbreaker was enraged. My emergence had damaged his House's reputation, and my continued glitching all but destroyed want remained of it. Windbreaker loathed the sight of me, and when my glitching increased after my youngling upgrades, I was committed to the Institute.”

 

Caution be damned, Jazz reached for the other mech's shoulder and gave it a friendly squeeze. He leaned in, cocking his helm to catch a look at Prowl's faceplate. From his profile, Jazz could see that the Praxian's expression was mostly flat, except for the barest hint of a frown on his lipplates and dimmed optics. It was as close to tears as the saboteur thought Prowl would likely get in the worst of circumstances. Smokescreen had not even hinted to this horror story, and Jazz realized that he was probably unaware of it. Prowl would not have wanted his creations to know he had been even moderately reprogrammed. The stigma attached was only surpassed by that of the victims of Empurata.

 

“At least thirteen hundred mechanisms have been reprogrammed for the express purposes of gaining control over their city,” Prowl said. While he did not lean in to Jazz's touch, he did not shy from it and the Polihexian took that as a sign that it might be welcome comfort. “It would not have been done in a therapeutic manner, it would have been done to twist them, indoctrinate them, render them into sociopaths. This is how the Decepticons plan to take Rodion.”

 

“You think this is what's happened, what's happening to my mechs?” Jazz asked. He did not need an answer, because he saw the same scheme unfolding in his HUD, and it only got worse. “This is what they want to do to Optimus.”

 

“That is my theory,” the Praxian replied. He turned his helm, and finally met Jazz's gaze, and as he spoke, his optics brightened. “This has been happening slowly, over stellar-cycles at least. I will not know until I can see him in face to face, but I suspect the lord of Rodion has been reprogrammed as well, along with the rest of Rodion's leadership. The Festival of Epistemus is merely a ruse to lure the Prime within their reach.”

 

“That ain't happenin',” the saboteur said with conviction. “You 'n me are gonna find those mnemosurgeons, and put'em outta business. Do you think it's possible to reverse it?”

 

“Perhaps,” Prowl replied. “With some, even the majority, it is unlikely. Reprogramming is not meant to be reverse. Components are removed, connections are severed, and reformed. More likely, the best that will be possible is reprogramming them again to a closer facsimile to what they once were. The back ups of you agents memory banks will not be enough to return them to rights. Their hardware will have been changed. Because of the medical records on file in Iacon, they maybe better to more accurately re-figure their processors.”

 

“Better that than leavin'em as 'Con slaves,” Jazz replied. “Is that how you feel about yourself? You're a facsimile?”

 

“I used to often wonder if I was who I was meant to be,” the tactician admitted. “If those things I enjoyed might not have been things that I ought to despise. I decided during my confinement at the Institute that all I could do was live the best that I could as I was. I refused all further treatments and determined to learn how to live with my defect.”

 

“How'd you convince them to release you from the Institute?” The Polihexian asked. It surprised him him that the other mech was willing to share this with him. There had been no record of it in the files Jazz had hacked. Then again, he had not gone into his youngling records.

 

“I resisted further mneomosurgery for stellar-cycles,” Prowl explained. “The mnemosurgeon in charge of the Institute at that time was receptive to alternative treatments, and even invented some of his own. Masters of different arts and sports were brought in to teach myself, and my fellow patients several times an orn. I found Diffusion to be especially helpful, and the Master paid me special attention. Nonetheless, my glitch was not cured, of course, though it was considerably better controlled. A new mnemosurgeon became CMO of the centre, and the Vicomagister and he agreed that it was high time I simply be reprogrammed, again. By then I had been studying Diffusion under the Master for a considerable time. He did not approve of such an extreme treatment, and when I realized this, I sought out his assistance. Through him I filed a petition in the courts to bar any mneomosurgeon from performing surgery on me without my express consent. The courts ruled in my favour, and I was released.”

 

“That had to have slagged of your Vicomagister,” Jazz said. Prowl nodded his helm.

 

“Not only had I defied him, I had won,” the Praxian confirmed the Polihexian's suspicions. “I had beaten him, and I have never been forgiven for my impertinence. Worse, under the laws, he remained required to house me. It was made clear that any further defiance would see me exiled from my House the instant I received my adult uprgrades.”

 

“How does that tactical system of yours play into this,” the saboteur asked. “Did he order you to get modded?”

 

“I volunteered to receive the ATS,” Prowl explained. “An Enforcer medic suggested that changes in my core programming exacerbated my glitch. As my youngling upgrades had, carrying and emergence did so again. I was functioning adequately within the Enforcers, but only barely. The Vicomagister made noise that he would see me reprogrammed this time, before I glitched on the street, and shamed his House further. My partner within the Enforcers went so far as to volunteer to perform the procedure when I mentioned what the Vicomagister had said.”

 

“Chromedome,” Jazz said.

 

“Affirmative,” the tactician replied. “He was angered that I did not trust mnemosurgery on myself, but that I valued it as an investigatory tool.”

 

“How'd he react when you got that ATS installed?” The Polihexian asked.

 

“He resigned from the Enforcers,” Prowl replied.

 

“Seriously?” Jazz exclaimed. “Because you made a _choice_ about _your_ frame?”

 

“He saw it as me finally stripping myself of my emotions,” the Praxian explained. “He had often accused me of being drone-like, he considered this validation of his claims.”

 

“You ain't a drone,” the saboteur declared, wrinkling his faceplates with disgust, before shaking his helm with a vent. Prowl's optics were on him, bright and flinty. “That's what you see in the mirror, ain't it?”

 

Prowl's silence was all the answer he needed. Jazz thought about the other's optics. He had held the mech's stare and seen keen intelligence. True, they were not emotionally expressive, and at first they might have seemed eerie, Jazz himself had thought them as cold. Maybe that much was still true, but cold did not mean empty.

 

“You don't look empty to me, Prowler,” Jazz said, the nickname slipping off his glossa before he noticed. “You look like you could loosen a few bolts, maybe, but there's nothin' empty or dead about your stare.”

 

There was a silence after the Polihexian spoke, and he did not try to fill it. It took Prowl a klik to consider what Jazz had said. When the tactician did finally speak, the saboteur was surprised by the detail that the Praxian had been stumbling over. Prowl turned his helm to look at Jazz, optics dimmed with contemplation. Deadpanned, he asked:

 

“Prowler?”

 

***

 

His spark burnt for Megatron's service. When Tread Bolt had come online again, he had felt as though he had emerged a new. The Decepticons were the only worthy masters of Cybertron, and one mech stood in the way of their ascension, Optimus Prime. Hate boiled over in the tall flier at the thought of the Prime. The Autobot insignia on Treadbolt's chassis offended his sensibilities, but his superiors had ordered that it remain. He had important work to do, Megatron's work to do.

 

Tread Bolt understood that for a vorn he had served the Autobot Special Operations. While he had been told upon coming online at the Rodion base that he had been an undercover operative, this information did not match the fog of his memories, and it was a fog. Many of his memories, of what he had done in his vorn in Iacon, were missing. The medics had said that he had been interrogated and damaged by the Autobots, that they, the medics, had only barely been able to repair him at all. He took this to be the truth, how could it be anything else?

 

A clear point in the fog of his processor was that somewhere in Rodion, a particular dangerous Autobot would be lurking. Perhaps it was a result of his torture at Autobot servos, but Tread Bolt could not say why he thought Jazz, the infamous Autobot operative, was in Rodion. He trusted his instincts, though, and if his instincts said Jazz was in Rodion, than he was. Jazz was almost certainly after him then. If he had been tortured at Autobot servos, why was Tread Bolt supposed to keep up the charade that he was a loyal Autobot? The answer was somewhere in the fog of memory banks, just out of reach.

 

This enraged him to an irrational degree. In a white rage he had destroyed most of his furnishings, and he had beaten his subordinate, the twitchy little minibot, Scrounge. Why Tread Bolt had been saddle with this useless excuse for a spy, the flier could not even begin to guess. What he did know, was that he needed to lure Jazz into the open where the Decepticons could capture him, and it would be Scrounge, not Tread Bolt to risk his neck to do this.

 

The twitchy little mech had not taken his assignment with enthusiasm, but the flier had beaten the proper spirit in to him. He had only allowed the worst of the damage he had dealt to the minibot repaired. Tread Bolt felt that a few dents, and scrapes would make his beg for rescue more convincing. Though ordering Scrounge to draw the sneaky Autobot out had been his idea, the flier was beginning to resent the fact that the minibot was out on the street, free to have a little fun as he waited for Jazz to show himself. Meanwhile, Tread Bolt was chafing at the bit; he wanted nothing more to fly for Iacon, and to stick his knife through the Prime's spark chamber.

 

Incoherent rage flooded the operative's systems, and he lifted the closest piece of furniture within his reach, and hurled it at the wall. The sight of the broken metal chair only enraged Tread Bolt further, and he flew at the wall with his fists. Before his blind rage had faded, the flier had both destroyed his hab suite, and his servos. Somewhere in his processor, Tread Bolt knew he was meant to have more self control, but he had no ability to resist his violent impulses. Anger rose in his spark, this time at himself, but it was not enough to cause another rage. His plating flared, and as pain made itself known in his ruined servos, the operative stalked out of his suite to the makeshift surgery set up in the basement of the Rodion “base”.

 

It only took a single abrupt glyph from the medic/mneomosurgeon present when the flier arrived to sent Tread Bolt into another fit of rage. More than the glyphs, there was something about the mnemosurgeon's faceplates that made him see red, and the flier attacked. A war cry that could not have been matched by the Winglords of Vos rang from his vocalizer as he lunged at his startled prey. The pain from his already broken digits did not touch his fury, and Tread Bolt rained down blow after blow, obliterating more and more of the mnemosurgeon's faceplate with each strike. There was a curse from behind him, and Tread Bolt leapt up off his victim to face the interloper. Before he could attack this new adversary, however a shock stick was jammed into his side. Charge scorched his circuits, and overloaded his systems, knocking his processor offline.

 

***

 

Med techs whose designations Motormaster had not been bothered to learn cleaned the broken husk off the warehouse floor. Had they been in Kaon or Polihex, with skilled Decepticons medics available, the mnemosurgeon might have been saved. But the basement “surgery” was primitive, with only the most basic medical tools. It was not as though mnemosurgeons needed equipment to do their work, the tools of their trade were install in their digits. So far as Motormaster was concerned, the greyed mnemosurgeon was no great loss. If the mech had done his job properly, the Autobot jet would not have gone postal.

 

“This is your fault,” Froid sneered.

 

“My fault?” Motormaster asked, outraged. “How's it my fault?”

 

“You were supposed to have the Autobot contained!” The mnemosurgeon snapped. “You were supposed to monitor him to ensure his emotional cortex stabilized. You weren't supposed to let him run free in my clinic!”

 

“This ain't a clinic, Froid,” the Road King replied, sneering back at the smaller mech. “This is a rusted, leaky basement. This is your job. Don't make excuses, do it. Keep the Autobot in stasis until you figure out how that sack of scrap fragged up his reprogramming.”

 

“Megatron has been informed of the setback,” Froid hissed. It took all of Motormaster's control not to pummel the mnemosurgeon, wonder of wonder, he managed. Patience, he reminded himself. Vengeance would come, perhaps not quickly but it would come, for this cocky shrimp, and that Praxian. “Expect a comm.”

 

“I've received the comm,” Barricade said as he strolled into the warehouse turned clinic. Motormaster snarled at him, ready to leap, to beat the slag out of the upstart, but the presence of Froid was enough to keep his temper in check. He would have his revenge. Barricade would be nothing but a leaking husk at his peds, but not yet. “You've been transferred, Motormaster. Seems your gestalt is wanted at Darkmount.”

 

“Oh yah?” Motormaster asked. He glared at the pompous prig.

 

“My team will be taking over here,” the Praxian said, that smug smile never leaving his faceplates. “Yours will return to Darkmount when the transport comes in. I trust that won't be a problem?”

 

“Don't expect me to take your glyph for it,” the convoy replied. “I'll see what Megatron says.”

 

The comm came from the Decepticon's SIC, not Megatron. Starscream was a grating slagtard but Motormaster knew better than to argue with the Seeker. He might have been king of the road, but Seekers were kings of the sky, and Starscream was too sneaky, and too smart to be lured into a fist fight with him. Too bad. Despite what both Froid and Barricade had insinuated, it was not a demotion. Straxus was having a hard time with the Dead End, and either separate, or together as Menasor, the Stunticons were best equipped to clean up any Autobot sympathizers, and to press gang any Empties in good enough shape to serve as cannon fodder.

 

It was a far better assignment than sitting on his aft sparkling sitting some jump start mnemosurgeon. Let Barricade “win” this one. There was nothing in Rodion that would get Barricade Megatron's attention or favour, but the Dead End had potential. Motormaster could make a real show in Dead End, and maybe get himself a nice promotion, or a pay raise! Yes, he would leave the Praxian and his buddies to rust in Rodion, and he would find himself a little glory, and a little gore in Polihex.

 

***

 

Prowl's recharge was fitful. Though Jazz had been quite the opposite of judging, speaking of his institutionalization, and of his reprogramming had left him emotionally drained, as well as that much more exhausted. He had been undercharged enough to cycle down to recharge quickly, but memory purges had woken him every few joors. Had he not been so exhausted, and had he been alone in the hab suite, Prowl would have risen with the first one, and gone to work. But he was running on fumes, and Jazz was recharging on the other side of the wall from him, and the Praxian did not want to wake the other mech. After bolting upright for the third time in the dark-cycle, Prowl wondered if he really ought to give up on recharge. His frame still exhausted, the former Enforcer lay flat on his back, and stared up at the ceiling.

 

The saboteur had a disturbing ability to make him speak. Prowl supposed it was a fitting skill for the Head of Special Operations, not that this fact did anything to make the knowledge that he had shared his most shameful secret to the mech any more palatable. When Prowl had entered the hab suite, prepared to reveal what he had discovered at the Enforcer precincts, he had had a convincing lie ready to bypass any personal enquiries. One looks from Jazz, and instead of those carefully rehearsed lies, the Praxian had spoken the truth, the shameful, ugly truth.

 

Most incomprehensible was that the Polihexian had been disgusted, _for him_ , angry, _for him_. No one had ever expressed any strong displeasure with how Prowl had been treated. Chromedome had been curious about the mnemosurgery process, and the practices of the Institute itself. Prowl's superiors in the Enforcers had, at best, expressed disappointment that the treatments had not resolved the glitch. No one had ever voiced concern about what stellar-cycles of isolation, and what commitment to a psychiatric institute might have done to him. No one had questioned what fighting the stigma of a commitment to the Institute throughout his adult vorns might have done to him. Because Prowl did not scream or despair about his treatment, no one acknowledged any fault in it. But how could he scream, or despair knowing that any swing in his emotions might lead to reinstitutionalization?

 

The Praxian's spark flared in his chassis at the thought. It had not occurred to him that he might have wanted comfort from anyone. He knew he was terrible at offering it, and often missed the signs that it was needed or wanted. Bluestreak had learned to take it as he needed it, and Smokescreen had learned to seek it elsewhere. Neither fact spoke highly of Prowl's procreating skills, but then whose example had he been meant to follow? If either of his creations ever decided to create, the Praxian hoped they would find better role models, and better partners, before than he.

 

Primus, he was tired. Smokescreen could look to Jazz. So far as Prowl knew, the mech had no creations; the Praxian did not even know if he was a receptive or contributive spark. It hardly mattered. Jazz was a superior role model, so far as emotional health was concerned, whether or not he had created. While Prowl continued to feel dubious about his elder creation's involvement with Special Operations, Smokescreen had at least found a good mentor in the Polihexian commander. The originator felt less concern for Smokescreen's future than he had at any other point in his creation's life, that was something positive in all of this. Once Bluestreak arrived in Iacon, there would be any number of potential role models or mentors for the youngling, though Prowl had always worried for him less. Perhaps that was a sign that he ought to worry more.

 

Prowl came online again when his alarm went off. He sat up in the berth and stretched out his doorwings. Recharging on his back on a berth not built for his frametype was never wise, however the Tironium suite's furnishing were plush enough that the tactician had suffered no repercussions. That he had dropped back into recharge without even realizing it, was a testament to the extent of his exhaustion. If Prowl was to do his best work on this mission, he needed to make better certain that he got at least some recharge consistently.

 

There was still a joor before Jazz was set to online. Some mega-cycles there was no time for this ritual, but whenever possible, Prowl started the light-cycle with Diffusion forms. This had been a key step to controlling his glitch before the ATS had been installed. While it could be skipped now, the Praxian had found that performing the forms still functioned to steady his spark and to clear his processor, and he had come to miss the ritual generally only on mega-cycles when he had not recharged at all. He had not performed the forms since departing Iacon.

 

After the previous mega-cycle's confessions, and the memory purges that had followed, a steady spark was very much desired. Prowl entered the first form, and silently went through each successful form in silence. He had always preferred to practice in his garden, where the song of the crystals served as a pleasant backdrop to his Diffusion meditation. The forms he was performing now were elegant at the slow pace he was using now. Add speed and strength, and these same forms became a deadly weapon. This was one of the factors that had drawn him to Diffusion.

 

As he had hoped, Prowl completed his forms with a clearer processor and a calmer spark. He was not a drone. His processor had not been reprogrammed in such a way as to have warped or eliminated his emotions or his morals. Jazz had been correct, the tactician did often see the hollow, too bright optics of the reprogrammed when he looked at his reflection. Whenever his ATS was on reduced power and his emotional cortex allowed to operate at normal parameters, Prowl still saw a disconnect between what he was feeling and what his optics revealed. It was intriguing that Jazz had claimed to see something in his optics, and the Praxian ideally wondered what it was.

 

Leaving those thoughts to his berthroom, Prowl entered the hab suite's great room. To his surprise, Jazz was already sitting on the lounge, drinking his light-cycle fuel. Before the Praxian went to fetch his own fuel, the other mech raised a second cube off the end table. How many times, since they had arrived in Rodion, had Jazz presented him with a cube around fueltime? At nearly every fueltime, the saboteur had either fetched two cubes or plates, or had asked Prowl to do so “while he was up”. It was hardly difficult to draw a conclusion from this. It was a testament to his poor recharge practices of late that tactician had not noticed the pattern until now.

 

“Smokescreen mentioned my fuelling habits,” he said as he accepted the cube and took his seat.

 

“He promised me you wouldn't starve yourself into emergency shutdown,” Jazz replied with a hint of a chuckle. “But he did say you get caught up in work 'n don't always remember to refuel right.”

 

“That is an accurate portrayal,” Prowl agreed, although internally begrudging.

 

“Don't sweat it, mech,” the Polihexian replied, waving his servo. “Your focus is why you're here. Drink up, 'n I'll catch you up on some slag.”

 

“Proceed,” the tactician said, taking a sip for his cube. It was a top quality mid grade from the hab suite's energon dispenser. Even without any added minerals or flavourings, it was considerably more pleasant that the Enforcer brew Prowl had mostly refuelled with for vorns. Did he actually miss that violet sludge?

 

“Got an invite in the dark-cycle,” Jazz explained. “Seems Lord Raptor's havin' a shindig, and he wants me, rather, Folgare to show his face.”

 

“It is unsurprising that the Lord of Rodion would have become aware of Folgare's presence,” Prowl replied “While media presence has been limited, guests and staff of the hotel have almost certainly been gossiping.”

 

“Figured we could use this to our advantage,” the saboteur said. “We need to know if the up 'n ups have been reprogrammed, this is how we find out.”

 

“In the event that the party turns hostile, will we be able to have our weapons?” The Praxian asked. Jazz grinned at him. It was an expression of mischief that reminded Prowl of Smokescreen. It was no wonder they got along.

 

“I've got a little hack that'll section off part of your subspace, any security sweep'll miss it,” Jazz explained. “I'll show you how to do it. Got anythin' you wanna get done this cycle?”

 

“Based on the number of mechanisms theoretically reprogrammed, the time required to perform the procedures, and the need to house them prior to the procedure, I have a suspicion that the Decepticon base will be somewhere in the warehouse district of the Dockyards,” Prowl replied. “With the secondary possibility that it will be in the vicinity of your agents' apartment in the Eastside. I would like to drive through the grids to find evidence as to which theory is correct.”

 

“I can dig it,” the Polihexian agreed, adding: “Acid storm's in the forecast for mid-cycle. Keep your comms open, and get back in time to avoid the storm.”

 

“Understood,” the tactician said.

 

The remainder of their fueltime passed with discussion of expectations and strategies for the dark-cycle's party. They would stay together, and avoid any attempts to separate them at all costs. Whether Prowl's role would be to be a zealous guard or a devoted lover would depend on the mechanisms around them. Jazz showed no signs of awkwardness or doubt in regards to the tactician's revelations the previous dark-cycle. Prowl could only say the same because of the ATS. Memories of that kiss slipped into his thought process, and he half feared and half hoped for another opportunity.

 

At his age, it was galling to have a youngling crush on another mech, and yet it was difficult to deny that the attraction, especially after the last dark-cycle. Worse, his tactical systems approved of the saboteur, and were quick to list the Polihexian's pros and cons, so far as they had the data. The potential fallout from voicing any such attraction were far greater than any possible benefit, and Prowl ruthlessly redirected his ATS to strategizing for the light-cycle's investigation. It was a relief to step from the hotel, to step away from his colleague, and to get to work.

 

Given the rarity of the Praxian frametype outside of Praxus, Prowl drove through the Eastside and the Dockyard grids in his alt mode. He had reprogrammed his colour nanites with the colours of his youngling vorns shortly after leaving the hotel. The boring grey and black paint let him blend into the streets with ease. This was the paint Prowl had chosen upon his release from the Institute, inspired by the image captures of Diffusion novices the Master had shown him. Though he had never been permitted to join a school, and thus had never had the right's to the novice's specific paint, Prowl had trained independently with the Master up until his adult upgrades. His training had ended when the elderly Praxian had decreed his training complete, and had in turn called him a Master. Prowl had never worn the glyph for Diffusion Master on his frame, having never officially been a novice, it did not seem right.

 

Though the ATS had placed higher odds on the Decepticon bases being housed in the Dockyards, specifically the warehouse district, Prowl spent considerable time canvassing the Eastside. In order to operate their clandestine mnemosurgey operation, the Decepticons needed a private, and secure base. There were large commercial buildings in the Eastside, and it remained a possibility that the Decepticons could be located there. Tread Bolt had struggled in the hab suite, surely he had struggled in the street. If the Decepticons did not possess a transport, then the base would have to be near to the agents' apartment. However, if they did possess a means of transporting a captive, then the Dockyards were the likeliest of locations for the mnemosurgery operation.

 

Prowl did not linger in any one spot for long. Enforcers regularly patrolled both grids. Nondescript in his alt mode, the Praxian watched from a safe distance as empty-opticed Enforcers seized mechanisms off the streets in the Dockyard, while their compatriots in the Eastside largely ignored the mechanisms all but rusting on the streets. The mechanisms being arrested did not have the look of Syk users or prosti-bots. They looked like skilled labourers, or common mechanisms with enough time, and a few credits to upkeep their frames. None of these details slipped through his ATS unexamined, and the tactician settled on one of the theories produced by those tactical systems. Morality begged him to intervene at each arrest, but logic was cold-sparked, and the tactician could only watch on.

 

Reprogrammed Enforcers were likely the ones arresting, or rather botnapping the mechanisms intended for reprogramming, and then delivering them to the Decepticon mnemosurgeons. Really, it made perfect sense. With prisoner transports, the Enforcers would be able to deliver their victims near anywhere. Exercising extreme caution, Prowl followed one pair of Enforcers after they had secured their prisoner, only to be led back to the Dockyard precinct. No prisoner transports came or went after a joor, and the tactician moved on. He still needed to canvass the warehouse district, and more importantly, Prowl could not afford to be noticed by the Enforcers.

 

Driving on from the Dockyards Enforcer station, the Praxian entered the warehouse district. He transformed, and stood in the shadows of two tall, dilapidated buildings. Hoping for any wandering mechanisms to mistaken him for a flier, Prowl angled his doorwings as long as they went, and kept his watching surreptitious. Residential housing had begun to encroach on the warehouses. With the decline in Rodion's economy, many warehouses stood empty, and some of those warehouses had been renovated into cheap apartments. More than a few of these converted warehouses had seen the funding of their construction disappear, and they stood half finished, and empty. At no point did any mechanism walk by.

 

It was an interesting development. There was a wealth of privacy, and space in the largely abandoned district. Homeless mechanisms from the Eastside grid should have moved into this space by now. Abandoned buildings attracted squatters, it was the nature of the world. Yet, there were no homeless mechanisms, and no security forces to keep them out, anywhere in sight. There was no one, at all, about. It was... strange. From the corner of his optic, Prowl saw a flash of black and purple. His spark stop spinning, and his seized. The Praxian flared his vents as he fought for air.

 

Stumbling backwards under the building's awning, Prowl crouched next to the construction materials abandoned there. Slowly, his intakes regulated his temperature, and his ATS again repressed his emotional cortex. Reason returned. It could not have been Barricade. Despite Prowl's insistence that this was true, the tactician could not immediately will himself to stand. He repeated the mantra in his processor, and forced himself to his peds. It felt like he was walking in wet concrete as it took a huge force of will to move each ped just one step forward.

 

It could not have been Barricade. While the idea of his tormentor joining the Decepticons did not seem far fetched, the idea that he would just happen to be in Rodion, whether alone or with the Decepticons seemed highly unlikely. Tormentor. The glyph was highly emotive, and yet his ATS agreed with that description. This was a dangerous thing. Glitches most often occurred when his inflamed emotion cortex and his ATS agreed on something distressing. Thankfully, his processor was not so delicate that these systems agreeing on a single glyph would send him into a glitch.

 

He was acting like a coward, and a fool. Prowl derided himself as he forced himself to walk at a quicker pace. In all likelihood, his processor was playing tricks on him, and the movement he had seen was likely just trash in the growing wind. However, the only way Prowl could confirm this was if he investigate it. Black and purple were hardly a rare colour combination. Plenty of materials, and mechanisms shared this colouring, and the idea that Barricade was lurking around the corner was preposterous. Spark spinning too fast in his chassis, Prowl kept close to the building, and he turned the corner.

 

He saw nothing but trash. A crumbled piece of dark metal rolled down the sidewalk under the force of the wind. The Praxian cursed his jumpy spark, and his eternally fritzed emotional cortex. A piece of trash. He was so on edge with the Barricade issue that he had mistaken a piece of trash for the mech.

Across the city-state, the storm was making itself known, acid rain would come with the wind that carelessly blew scrap through the empty street.

 

It was easy for Prowl to convince himself that returning to the hotel _now_ was the best course of action. Though a thorough search of the area would take time, and would realistically take Jazz too, the Decepticons were likely holding two Autobot agents, possibly even only meters away, from where he stood. Nonetheless, Praxian felt no hesitation at all at abandoning them. Obeying his core programming this time, he quickly transformed, and fled from the Dockyards.

 

End Chapter 12.

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think my eyes glazed over trying to proof read this chapter. It's a good bit longer than the last couple XD. Let me know if you catch anything glaringly bad. I'll get back to editing previous chapters this week, now that this chapter is up. Next update won't happen until I've got up.


	13. Chapter 13

Before Jazz saw to his frame, he took his sole surviving instrument from his subspace. Though it looked immaculate as it was, he still spent a good joor polishing, and tuning it to perfection. His spark ached at the sight of it, at the touch of it. The soft cords that sang as he carelessly plucked at the strings brought a brief wave a pleasure to him, before it dissolving into crushing agony. He had been playing this instrument the very joor the Fellowship had been attack, had been playing it when he had felt the blow to his spark as Ric's had been snuffed out. Of all of his instruments, this was the one Jazz had most strongly wanted to destroy, but Ricochet had given it to him, so even if the sight of it was spark crushing, the saboteur had never been able to discard it.

 

Maybe he should have bought a new one, or a new zither, or a flute. If Jazz was to be stuck playing any instrument... He plucked another string, and off-lined his optics. There was no sound just like it. Even after he had vowed to never sing, to never play another piece, the music played with the cithara still struck the deepest cord in him. String instruments had always been his favourite, whether to play or to listen to, maybe because they lent themselves to voice parts. In another time, another life, his favourite thing in the world had been to surround himself with friends or family, and play and sing the old epics and laments.

 

It was not, had never been logical to deprive himself of music, to cut off this part of himself, but Jazz could hardly touch or look had his cithara without spark searing guilt. The chance to perform, to play and to sing in front of a crowd, had always been his preferred part of any assignment. Whatever theft, observation, or assassination had actually been the core purpose of his presence in far off locals, had always been only been a nagging duty. Funny how spying, killing, and sabotaging had become his purpose, and often his pleasure. Jazz let out a long vent, introspection never left him in a good mood.

 

Hopefully Prowl was having a more productive light-cycle. The saboteur stood up from the lounge, leaving his cithara on the seat. Though his finish was in decent shape, for a hoity toity party, it needed to be pristine, and he needed to get to it. Whatever they had left of the light-cycle when Prowl return, would likely need to be spent getting the Praxian ready, the mech's mid to low shine would not do this dark-cycle. On that note, Prowl would probably need some help. Polishing one's own back took a certain trick, and doorwings struck Jazz as a bit of a complication.

 

Just how did he offer to help without stepping all over some weird Praxian etiquette. He knew doorwings were a bigger, potentially even more erogenous zone than his own horns. Flight wings were sensitive in the right conditions, but not shockingly so. Air currents, and G-forces meant that the wings of Seekers and their kin could not be hyper sensitive. In fact, the plating of most flight frames was less sensitive that ground frames because of these factors. Now, they could tweak their sensors when called for, interface being the primary time when such adjustments were done. Praxians were ground frames, and their doorwings were strictly sensory appendages, could their sensors be tweaked enough that touch was not erotic, or not painful?

 

This was one of those questions the Polihexian would have benefited from asking Smokescreen, not that he had thought of it back in Iacon. The data-net was full of erotica starring Praxians, but if they were to be trusted, a Praxian could be brought to his knees by a simple touch to his doorwings, and made to overload with only a little more pressure. All of that sounded farfetched to Jazz. There was no avoiding the thought train that came with this ruminations, and Jazz was quick to delete the image of Prowl in the throws of passion just as soon as his processor imagined it. Yes, the mech was pretty, and yes, those doorwings were especially tempting, but there was no way the Polihexian's digits were going to go near a single centimetre of doorwing if Prowl was going to get off one it. He had to keep working with the mech from Primus' sake!

 

Though the thought was hideous, Jazz distracted himself from doorwings, and temptation by thinking back on what the Praxian had revealed. He could not wrap his helm around the idea that Prowl's procreators had had him reprogrammed as a two tier sparkling. How in the Pit had they rationalized it? They had willing exiled themselves when faced with the scandal. Reading between the lines, the saboteur guessed that they had never returned. When their youngling had been institutionalized, they had not come to support him, or to oversee his treatment. They had decided to create, and when Prowl had not come out perfect, that paid a mnemosurgeon to “fix” him instead of listening to their medics. It had been better to butcher their sparkling to accept a defect. What in the actual frag?

 

It was no wonder that Smokescreen had found his originator distant, or aloof. Prowl had not had a fragging clue as to how to raise a creation, he had not himself been raised. Though the tactician had not said as much, Jazz guessed that he was distrustful, if not all out afraid of his own emotions. If emotions triggered his glitch, and glitching could get him locked up, it was not surprising he had elected to get the _thing_ installed. Rather than having to will his emotions down when they bubbled over, Prowl now just had to flick the figurative switch in his processor, and good dark-cycle emotional cortex. His elder creation was a mech that needed more emotional validation than others, and Prowl's move of self-preservation had all but crippled their relationship, tenuous as it sounded always to have been. Still, Jazz could hardly blame Prowl for his decision.

 

All in all, it made the tactician all the more impressive, and all the more sympathetic in the Polihexian's optics. If he was a cold aft, it was because he had been abandoned, and abused by his kin, left to smother a part of himself to survive. And he had actually survived, Prowl had resisted being reprogrammed again, had won in the courts over his much senior guardian. Despite his glitch, despite having been institutionalized for a good chunk of his younglinghood, he had had the drive, and the ability to make, and to excel at his career. When the Autobot generals argued, and they would, Prowl was going to drive right over them; this was one mech that could stand up to those stubborn scraplets without a care. He could survive the animosity that would surely come from the rank and file, because he had already survived the scorn of his family. It would probably not be the most pleasant life for Prowl, but if he could open himself up at all, Jazz thought he might find life better in Iacon than in Praxus.

 

Did the mech know what it was like to be happy? The Polihexian did not anticipate a great deal of happiness for Prowl in the Autobots. Frustration, even desperation seemed that much more likely, but was that any different from his life in Praxus? Jazz had intended to walk away from this mission, and to leave the tactician to his own business, but now he was reconsidering this plan. Obviously, given the pretty clear picture that Prowl and Chromedome had been involved, the tactician was not completely anti-social. While Jazz did not think he wanted to become super tight with Prowl, he thought friends could work. Certainly, it would be of some benefit to the Praxian. Someone would have to make sure the mech did not work himself into deactivation.

 

Jazz let his thoughts run along this thread as he washed, polished, and buffed his platting. The trick to getting one's back was to simply to remove the plating. It was not all that tricky, and even in Folgare's configuration, the armour clipped on and off saboteur's protoform with relative ease. When he was finished his “spit shine”, and turned to give himself a critical optic, Jazz thought he might blind someone with his finish. There was no mistaking him now, every mechanism at the party would know he was Folgare the nanoklik they saw him.

 

Artfire had designed the look, all the way down to the ultra-bright finish. Sadness bled into Jazz's spark. This was why his brother-in-law had been with him in Kalis, instead of with Ricochet in Polihex. Kalis had been a big show, there had been a chance that it could have been the shift from double life to principle life. Jazz had been just steps away from leaving the Fellowship behind. His brother-in-law had wanted his finish perfect, absolutely perfect, had wanted Jazz to look like a falling star. Ricochet had lamented being stuck in Polihex with his own duties, instead of watching the show. Because Jazz had wanted Folgare, wanted his music, to be his life, his family had wanted it for him.

 

Folgare had so very nearly been his life.

 

The door opened, and ped steps Jazz had come to recognize as Prowl's followed. Curious to learn what the Praxian might have discovered, the saboteur joined him in the great room. Something about Prowl the seemed off, causing Jazz to dim his optics in alarm. Taking care that his EMF not reveal his suspicions, the saboteur closed the distance between him and the other mech. At second glance, there was nothing physically different about Prowl. He had no scuffs or scrapes to his plating, rather Prowl looked the same as when he had left the hab suite a few joors earlier. Surely, he could not have been snatched by the mnemosurgeons, reprogramming took too much time. Besides, Prowl practised Diffusion, and there would be no taking him down without a lot of damage.

 

There were walls up in his optics. Prowl had described the optics of the reprogrammed as empty, and had eluded to feeling that way about his own. He was wrong. Though the tactician did not have even remotely expressive optics, they struck Jazz as guarded versus empty. The walls were up even tighter now, and the Polihexian wondered what might have caused this. Relaxing now that his inspection had found Prowl fit, if withdrawn, he cocked his helm at his partner. With any luck, Prowl would share whatever was bothering him.

 

“So what do you think?” Jazz asked. “Eastside or Dockyards.”

 

“The Dockyards, specifically the warehouse district,” Prowl replied. “The sub-district that borders the Eastside is suspiciously empty. Warehouses that were being converted into housing in recent stellar-cycles, prior to losing funding, make up the bulk of the structures. Given the closeness to the Eastside, these buildings should have been taken over by the transients, and addicts living on the fringes of the district. Buildings empty for any considerable time attract squatters, it is a matter of fact, and yet there were none. There were no security patrols to explain their absence either. There was... no one at all.”

 

“Funny,” Jazz said, considering the tactician's discovery. “Yah, that screams 'Cons. Spot anything else?”

 

“I suspect that the Decepticons are gaining access to their targets through the reprogrammed Enforcers,” the Praxian explained. “I witnessed three suspicious arrests in the Dockyards. I theorize that the Enforcers are delivering the Decepticons' targets to the mnemosurgeons via Enforcer transports. When the mnemosurgery is complete, the newly reprogrammed captives would be released to the street by the Enforcers, without drawing unreasonable suspicion.”

 

“Clever, and sick,” the saboteur murmured, disgusted with the thought. “You were busy. We'll work out a plan for hittin' the warehouse district in the next couple'a cycles. Right now, party's in a few joors. I'm just about ready, so the 'racks all yours. Think over the top... Smokey on his way to a party maybe.”

 

“I believe I understand,” Prowl replied. There was a quick, downward dip in his doorwings, and the Polihexian nearly missed it.

 

“Will you need a helpin' servo?” Jazz asked, being as casual as he could muster. “Uh, unless you've got a trick for your doors.”

 

“Some assistance will likely prove beneficial,” the tactician agreed. “I do not imagine the washracks is equipped with the tools for me to do an adequate job myself.”

 

“Holler when you need me,” the Polihexian replied, grateful to have dodged that etiquette bullet.

 

Prowl did not take an unusually short or long time to get his washing done. It was almost comical when he sent a comm burst to Jazz precisely two breams after he had entered the washracks. There was a military efficiency to the mech that would not have been out of sync within the Primal Vanguard. Actually once the slave driver figured him out, Ultra Magnus was going to adore Prowl... So far as he adored anyone... Alright, Ultra Magnus was going to approve of him... probably. Jazz shook his helm at the thought and wondered into the washracks.

 

Armour freshly washed, and its old finish stripped, Prowl stood in his customary rigid pose. He inclined his helm in Jazz's direction. His guard had gone down a bit, his optics more clear and less flinty. Watching Enforcers arrest potentially innocent people, likely in order to see them reprogrammed, had to have been hard for Prowl. That he had resisted any temptation to intervene spoke volumes about the tactician's self control. There had been times when Jazz had faced that same, terrible choice, reveal yourself or let an innocent be harmed. As he had become a more seasoned operative, the Polihexian had learned that keeping himself concealed was inevitably the best choice for his own survival, and the survival of those tied to his mission. It had never stopped bothering him. If it ever did stop, that would be a clear sign that Jazz needed to step out of the business.

 

“If you will see to the backs of my doorwings, I will tend to the rest of my frame,” Prowl said.

 

“Sure thing,” Jazz replied. He picked up the jar of polymer sealant from the counter. It looked to be similar stuff as he had seen Smokescreen use, same as the jar of wax next to it.

 

“Smokescreen purchased it for me some time ago,” the Praxian explained when he caught Jazz examining the containers.

 

“You got plenty left,” the saboteur observed. “Don't go all out often?”

 

“The last occasion I found it necessary to use this level of product was for the change of command ceremony when I became Praefectus Vigilum,” Prowl said. “I have found the necessary upkeep of either products to be time prohibitive.”

 

“No argument there,” Jazz agreed. With care, he began to apply the first thin layer of sealant to the Praxian's right doorwing. The broad panel stood stiff from Prowl's back. There was no twitch, no reaction at all to the touch. “This doesn't hurt you?”

 

“I have calibrated my sensors to their lowest levels,” the tactician explained. “They have minimal sensation.”

 

“Nifty trick,” the Polihexian replied. He focused on his task, ensuring he did not apply the finish too thick. This information seemed to directly counter those soap opera stories plots about doorwing sensitivity. If forced into servo to servo combat, a Praxian would obvious just drop their sensitivity down, rather than be brought down by a hit to their doorwing. “Do you want me to get your back while I'm here?”

 

“If it is not a trouble,” Prowl said.

 

“Not a bit,” Jazz replied as he ran a curing lamp over the tactician’s back to set the first layer of sealant, before moving on to the next. As he looked for any flaws he asked: “How do Praxians usually deal with this. Gettin' dolled up, I mean.”

 

“Most Houses of any means employ detailers,” the Praxian explained. “Those too long in the hierarchy to live within the compounds would either go to salons, or pay a fee to their Vicomagister for the service of the House detailer.”

 

“Guess you used the House one,” the saboteur said.

 

“When necessary,” Prowl confirmed. “As a rule I have utilized the lowest maintenance sealant possible so the need for a detailer has be a rarity for me.”

 

“Tell you what, point out where you could use a servo, and I can detail for you,” Jazz offered.

 

Between the two of them, Prowl's plating was sealed and waxed to a deep shine with plenty of time to spare. The rich finish drew attention to the Praxian's strong lines, and the raised details on his chassis. His chevron, painted a soft gold at the moment, like the plating of his upper arms and legs, drew direct attention to his icy blue optics. He looked good, real good, almost too much so. From his subspace, Jazz took a pair of false lenses. There was something about Prowl's optics that was entirely unique to him, to the saboteur at least, even with the change of paint and finish, Prowl looked like Prowl.

 

“Put these on,” the Polihexian advised. “They take some gettin' used to, but gotta know there's gonna be reporters around. Odds are no mechanism would recognize you if they saw you, but just in case.”

 

“It would be wise take precautions,” the tactician said. “It has been a quarter vorn since I have been the subject of media scrutiny, but any chance of a link between Pantera and Prowl could be disastrous.”

 

“Thought you'd see it that way,” Jazz replied.

 

The gold optics did their job. Prowl looked like a different mech. Thanks to the warm tone of the lenses, even the Praxian's default expression looked warmer. Jazz wondered what the affect of the polish and sealant would be like with Prowl's predominately white paint job. Potentially even more attractive, especially with his blue optics. When Jazz tried to think of passing Prowl off as a simple guard, the saboteur's lipplates pulled into a small smirk. Sure, his military barrings suited the suggestion, but any hot sparked sycophant that attended this party was sure to question how licentious Folgare could not resist be keeping “Pantera” to warm his berth.

 

***

 

What had happened that had seen Jazz deny his gift for music? Prowl was hardly in any position to espouse the illogicality of shutting off, or cutting out a part of oneself. Folgare, Jazz had said, was an undercover persona from before his enlistment with the Autobots. Polihex had been rumoured to be the secret spark of the Decepticon movement since nearly the very beginning. Certainly, it had never been an Autobot stronghold. Like Rodion the population was brutally poor, with the worst, called Empties, living in the Dead End. It had been whispered for some time that the Decepticons used those derelict mechanisms for target practice. If Jazz had been an operative for Polihex, he may have seen, even done, some truly hideous things.

 

Having the Polihexian's assistance in detailing his frame could have, even should have been awkward, but Prowl had kept his private thoughts professional, pointedly utilizing his tactical systems to further prepare for the operation ahead, and so they did not turn to analyzing or strategizing his personal life. Jazz was a quick servo at detailing as well, which made the whole process go much faster. Once Prowl's final coat of wax had been cured, the tactician caught an approving smile on the saboteur's lipplates. He _would_ deny that that smile had any effect on him. The prospect of posing as Jazz's, or rather Folgare's lover sparked both anticipation and dread in Prowl's spark. Before either emotion could gain traction, the tactician fed more power to his tactical systems.

 

It really was not natural to operate either one's logic processor, never mind one's battle computer at such a high level of power for such considerable lengths of time, and so in lulls when Prowl was not actively processing data or formulating strategies, his tactical systems would slowly drop to a lower power usage, and thus that power would redistribute to the Praxian's emotional cortex, hence these random flares of emotion. Maintaining the level of power distribution to his ATS that would automatically mute his emotional cortex took no thought during tactical planning or data analysis, during the rest of his joors, it required conscious effort.

 

When all was said and done, Prowl did not trust his emotions, or at the very least, his glitch. Some might call it an excuse, but it was a good one. No one would accept a mech in any position of influence that glitched when startled, or confused, or with no real clear trigger. If he was simply allowed to glitch, to recover, and to continue on, the Praxian thought he would be less wary of emotionality, but the reality was that glitched mechanisms were seen as _less_ by fully functional mechanisms. As long as he wish to serve a higher purpose than rusting away behind locked doors, Prowl would hold his emotions down, and keep his glitch at bay.

 

Once they were on the road to the Rodion Heights, the tactician fell into his old investigator habits, and his focus naturally split between the road he was driving, and the buildings and the mechanisms around him. He was always aware of Jazz's presence a head of him, but the Polihexian garnered no attention from his ATS as Prowl fed every sight and sound through his logic processor for analysis. Much like the rest of Rodion, these poor copies of the Translucentia Heights were more veneer than substance. The skyscrapers were built of common cybertronium, but they had been painted to mimic the look of cybertite. It did not take an expert optic to see it was all an illusion.

 

Concerning to Prowl was the number of Enforcers patrolling the Rodion Heights. It was unfortunately common Enforcer practice in many city-states. The wealthy wanted to feel safe, and the bloated number of Enforcers on their prettily painted streets created that very illusion at the expense of other grids. Though he could not pause long enough to give each patrolling Enforcer a good look, those he managed to steal glances at, stopped at traffic lights, had the bright dead optics of the reprogrammed. At the same time, most of the Rodion Heights' residents Prowl saw strolling along the market district had normal, expressive faceplates, some however, did not. It made the tactician wonder how it was that no one appeared to notice the changes to the Enforcers patrolling their streets, the shop owners selling them wares, and the neighbours living next door.

 

“What do you see?” Jazz asked via the comm.

 

“15% of the residents I have observed appear to have been reprogrammed, 32% of the business proprietors as well,” Prowl replied, outlining his observations in a concise fashion. “All of the Enforcers, as I had anticipated. While there is an increased number of Enforcers patrolling the Rodion Heights compared to the other districts, they are largely inactive, and they do not appear especially observant. I counted six potential exit points should we need to leave the Heights in with great speed, and have produced a map.”

 

“Send in my way,” the Polihexian said. Prowl did as was requested, and sent his teammate the encrypted file via the data-net. A brief silence followed as Jazz split his focuses between driving, and looking over Prowl's map. There was a ping in the tactician's processor as Jazz send the filed back his way, with a few additions, saying: “Nice work. Let's hope we don't have to test it out. Time to make our appearance. You ready?”

 

“Yes,” the Praxian's reply was monosyllabic and without emotion. He was actually calm, over all. The ATS kept his attention focused on the tactical side of the operation at hand, and the anxious twinges from his spark went unnoticed. Even as they transformed in front of the flashy skyscraper's towering, Prowl's tactical systems were taking in data, and outputting potential tactics to utilize in face of a host of different attacks or situations. With familiar ease, Prowl analyzed them, and sorted them into the appropriate databanks. Strategies solely put together via his battle computer were not as polished as those he actively produced, but even the unpolished plans of his ATS could be of value.

 

The flash of cameras did not surprise him, or particularly unnerve him. He had been in front of cameras, in front of the press, often during his early mega-cycles in metaforensics, less often as Praefectus Vigilum. Prowl had never enjoyed it, had never enjoyed the interviews, or the politicking. It was a simple fact that he was not a charismatic mech, and Enforcer Command had eventually seen reason, and assigned a single outgoing, and personable Enforcer to be the communication officer for the whole of the city-state. Though he had never said anything, Tumbler had seemed disappointed at the loss media limelight. This had been the first serious crack in their professional and personal relationship.

 

Jazz came to life under the flashing lights. He looked like a piece of art, as dozens of flashing lights reflected off his armour. It was a dazzling affect, one that momentarily made Prowl pause. Questions leapt out from the crowd of media personal, ranging from serious journalists, and tabloid parasites.

The questions bled into each other, each spoken over the next, obscuring those asked a nanoklik before until it became one loud indecipherable noise. Few bothered to take more than a token image capture of Prowl, as he stood, half frozen a few paces behind his partner.

 

“One at a time my friends,” Jazz purred. Folgare's voice was a half-tone higher than the Polihexian's standard tone, and he spoke with a melodic lilt.

 

“Will you be performing at the party, Maestro?” A quick voice shout out as the rest quieted.

 

“I'm just here for a good time,” the spy turned musician relied.

 

“And good company?” Another voice, and another question, this one asked with a suggestive air. At this, the mob of reporters turned their focus onto the Praxian, likely just noticing his presence now.

 

As Prowl lifted his optics to the throng, he did not fear being recognized. The gold glass of the false lenses distorted his colour perception but it was a fair sacrifice. He stayed where he had stopped when the reporters had descended on them. Jazz turned his helm to face him, offering him a warm, and reassuring smile. A single curled digit beckoned him over, and Prowl joined Jazz in front of the crowd, letting the other mech loop their arms together.

 

“Be nice to my escort, this one's shy,” Jazz ordered. Laughter erupted from the media personalities. Keeping with his “shy” persona, Prowl forced only the briefest smile onto his faceplates, before he looked away from the reporters.

 

“Have you been hiding in Praxus this whole time?” A reporter asked.

 

“Now, now, you know I'm not going to answer that,” the musician scolded. “My privacy is very important to me. Have a good evening, my friends, I'm not one to be late.”

 

The cultured accent suited the image of Folgare, but it did not suit the mech behind the disguise. It must have taken considerable training to make the accent so natural. Had Prowl not known differently, he would never have guessed the “Folgare” generally spoke with the accent of the lower class. Jazz was a super actor. Knowing that he could not say the same for himself, the Praxian waffled between remaining aloof, and silent throughout the party, or all but worshipping Folgare.

 

“Just stay with me, lover,” Jazz said, all but whispering the glyphs into Prowl's audials. Those already mingling in the ballroom paused from their conversations as the pair stepped inside. With the chance that someone might over here, and the fact that comm use in a party was considered crass, the Polihexian kept in character as he spoke to Prowl. “I'm not going to leave you at their mercy.”

 

***

 

Splitting time, and mech power, between the mnemosurgery operation, and observations from his team's suite was a little taxing, but it remained a welcome change. Motormaster was licking the wounds to his ego in Polihex, and Barricade was rightly in charge. They needed a few more helping servos if they wanted to keep the operation well guarded. Brawl had suggested his own gestalt might be up for the change of scenery. For a moment, Barricade had been concerned that his gestalt insult might have soured his working relationship with Brawl, but the war-build had shrugged it off. The Stunticons were a poor excuse for a gestalt, so far as that mech was concerned, and his own Combaticons were naturally superior. What remained to be seen was if Brawl, and his gestalt brothers would take orders from him when Onslaught was around, and if Onslaught would take orders at all.

 

As it was, there were not enough on the streets, and the Combaticons would have to be transferred from their current station before they could join up, leaving the operation vulnerable for the time being. Someone in Decepticon Command had not thought this one through. As soon as Motormaster and his ilk had been transferred, replacement grunts should have been shipped in. Barricade thought best to blame Starscream, although he would not say as much to the screechy Seeker's faceplates.

 

Thankfully, there were enough medical assistants to keep Froid happy down in his “clinic”, so apart from ensuring that the reprogrammed Autobot remained under lock and key, there was not much Barricade needed to do down in that leaking basement. He swore he could smell rust in there, even if he could not see it. Knowing that his team was watching from the apartment across from the clinic, the Praxian did not spend any time looking for interlopers as he exited the warehouse hiding the mnemosurgeons, and crossed the street to return to the hab suite.

 

He needed a shower, needed a cube, ideally of engex. Froid was narcissist, and he sure as Pit thought he was smarter that the Praxian, but that was fine. Barricade had outmanoeuvred smarter mechanisms than the mnemosurgeon. Prowl had not beaten him, not a chance. They were, just at a stalemate, that was all. When the disgraced Enforcer returned to Praxus, Barricade would break the stalemate, and win at last. With the cowardly runt stuck in the Ordo compound acting as convenient bait, it would be easy to lure his prize within reach when the time came.

 

“You just missed a guest,” Blackout said as Barricade entered the hab suite.

 

“Ya?” The Praxian asked, all ruminating ceased as his alarm peaked.

 

“Urayan I think,” the rotary replied. “Came around the corner when you were coming up. Looked like flight wings, he took off when I was calling Brawl over to take a look. Didn't get a real good look.”

 

“Lots of Urayan slagtards in the Dockyards,” Brawl said. “Cheap workers.”

 

“If he shows his faceplates again, shoot and we'll ask questions later,” Barricade ordered. This mech was hardly the first intruder to be spooked by the empty streets, and by the stories they had spread throughout the Eastside. The so called sewer mutants were a good deterrent, and the junkies and whorebots of the Eastside had stupid enough to believe in them, at least so far. “Any idea when your team is going to turn up?”

 

“They're stuck in Tarn for a bit,” the gestalt member explained. “The team glitch got them in detention again.”

 

“Swindle or Vortex,” Blackout asked. Barricade raised his brow ridge. He had heard of Vortex, a rotary like Blackout, he was known for being violent, and insane. It was also rumoured that he was Megatron's best interrogator.

 

“Swindle, but both really,” Brawl sighed and shook his helm. “Swindle swindle the wrong mech, got his aft handed to him. Vortex took that as a personal insult, once 'Tex got into it, the rest dove in, and trashed the better part of an oil bar, and most of the mechanisms drinking in it.”

 

“And I'm supposed to want them here?” the former Enforcer asked, with a dubious look at his subordinate.

 

“Sure,” the tank said. “Apparently Swindle's got the audials of Meister, the real spybot of Iacon. If the Autobots have launched a search mission for their missing spies, he might be able to attach himself to the mission.”

 

Barricade looked back out at the street. He had been careless. No one should have been able to get that close to their base with him on the street. If the mech returned, Barricade was going to take him apart out of principle. It was a wake up call, and not a bad one in the end, he supposed. They would do patrols, as regular as possible. Brawl would go back to the Eastside and get that rumour flying again, maybe take the show directly to the Dockyards. No idiot junky was going to make a mess of this assignment; Barricade had a reputation to build. Even if they were violent psychopaths, the Praxian would take Brawl's team. After after all, Barricade was no stranger to violent mechanisms. There was no question that the Autobots would send out more operatives to hunt down their missing spies. The prospect of landing his own spy into the Autobot team was too good to pass up.

 

“That actually sounds like a plan,” Barricade said. “Tell'em to be on their best behaviour. Maybe I can get their sentences cut.”

 

End Chapter 13.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long delay in posting this chapter. Bit of a family issue going on right now, and my muse is only just really coming back. That said, I'm back to writing so hopefully the next chapter won't take so long to go up.


	14. Chapter 14

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I kind of hoped this chapter would write itself, and it sort of did. 
> 
> Thank you so much for reading, for leaving kudos, and for reviewing. I eat up every hit to this fic!

Primus but the ballroom was gaudy. Faux crystal chandeliers hung from the ceiling, faux crystals of every colour had been broken, apart to make the mosaic tile of the floor. Metres of fine mesh material draped on every wall. A raised stage sat at one corner, with prismatic spotlights that changed colour as the quartet played. Jazz could not fault the musicians, they were definitely a talented set. You would not have noticed if shock pop had been playing however, thanks to the scene unfolding all around them.

 

This was no ordinary party. Jazz almost laughed, very nearly on the verge of hysterics. Lounges lined every wall, save for a space for an oil bar at the back, and the stage in the front. Clusters of seats doted the floor. It was not the layout of the room, or the furnishings at had the Polihexian on the swallowing his laughter, it was the elicit activities been undertaken on every spare surface. It was an orgy. While some mechanisms mingled, and service mechanisms, bared to their protoforms, served engex, and themselves, most of the party-goers were tangled up with each other.

 

Eventually, someone noticed the arrival of the Maestro, and even the mechs and femmes interfacing paused in their debauchery to catch a look at the musician. Unbelievable. Folgare's reputation had certainly always been licentious, but Jazz had never really considered that any mechanism would have invited him to join in this... scene.

 

Prowl felt stiff on his arm, but Jazz was not surprised by that observation. The mech was from a proper House, and conducted himself with a pretty high level of decorum, this was probably on the list of most obscene thing the Praxian had ever witnessed. To his credit, Prowl did not recoil at the sight, or otherwise draw attention to himself. What he did do, surprised Jazz. Instead of an open, but empty field brushing his own, there was just the fate electrical fuzz of a drawn EMF. Clever mech. A silent field was an oddity, but a retracted on was normal enough. The tactician continued to surprise and impress the seasoned operative, and Jazz wondered if he might not be able to borrow Prowl for ops from time to time, at least until he got his department back up to snuff.

 

“I believe the Lord of Rodion is approaching,” the tactician said, in a soft monotone, flashing his optics in the tall grey and blue mech walking towards them, followed by a similarly tall, purple and grey mech.

 

“I guess we'll say our hellos,” Jazz replied, static tinged the final glyph as he final forced the hysteria back. He did not want to come across as a lunatic.

 

“Maestro Folgare, thank you for joining us,” the mech greeted the musician with a dramatic introduction. “I am Legonis, Lord of Rodion.”

 

“It's my pleasure to be here, my lord,” Folgare replied, demurely. “It's a lovely space.”

 

“Thank you, I oversaw the redesign of this space myself,” the lord said. He did not bother to introduce the mech standing behind him, no doubt this was the lofty mech's assistant.

 

“You have excellent taste,” the musician praised, making a show of looking around the room, before pausing to watch the band, and the staff as the circled the room. “Good choice in entertainment as well.”

 

“Not so good as the Maestro,” Legonis countered. Folgare smiled, and chuckled.

 

“Oh I don't know about that,” he replied. “I haven't performed in vorns. You see my lord, but I found performing was never my passion. The group you hired, now they are performers!”

 

“An important distinction, I'm sure,” the lord said, nodding. He looked to the disguised Prowl now, giving the Praxian a long look. “Is your companion a musician?”

 

“Pantera is in private security,” Folgare explained. “Mostly he ensures I am secure!”

 

“My lord,” Pantera greeted, with a dramatic sweep of his doorwings. Legonis preened, obviously familiar with a gesture.

 

“You will inform me if you see any... unforgivable lapses in our security measures?” Legonis asked.

 

“As you wish, my lord,” the Praxian replied.

 

“Absolutely,” the Rodion lord said. “Now, you needn't worry about any... sensitive holo-vids leaking to the press. This room is completely free of recording devices. I want my guests to feel completely comfortable. Now if you'll excuse me, I the senators have arrived. I must greet them.”

 

“Don't dawdle on our account,” Folgare replied. “Thank you for your excellent hospitality.”

 

The Autobot spies watched the lord flounce over to the newest arrivals before moving on. They mingled, so much as was necessary until most of the other guests returned to interfacing. For a long moment, they stared out over the room. Servants, their bared protoforms polished to a shine, wandered over to the newcomers, offering flavoured oils, hors d'oeuvres, and tall flutes of engex. Unwilling to attract any more special attention, both mechs took a flute, and a small plate of energon goodies and savoury oil cakes to share, and found themselves an empty lounge in a quiet corner to the side of the band. Only when the nearest other mechanisms were well out of hearing, and well occupied did Jazz speak.

 

“He didn't mention it was this kinda party,” Jazz whispered, falling back into his natural voice out.

 

“Folgare did have a reputation,” Prowl replied in an equally quiet voice.

 

“Nothin' like this!” the Polihexian sputtered. “Primus. So what do you think of Legonis?”

 

“The lord has not been reprogrammed,” Prowl replied. “Nor have any of the guests I have observed.”

 

“That throws a wrench in our theory,” Jazz said.

 

“Not entirely,” The Praxian countered, with a brief shake of his helm. He nodded a doorwing to the nearest security-mechanisms. “Look at them.”

 

Jazz did as directed. They were the only mechanisms present completely withdrawn from the orgy. It was obvious that they were not here to “entertain” any of the guests, unlike the servers. Though Jazz was doubtful of what he was expected to observe, he took a good look at the nearest guard, and when he saw the mech's faceplates dead on, he finally understood. The guard closest to them, just out of audial range, but not out of the focus of the Polihexian's clever optics watched the orgy with blindingly bright optics. At a passing glance, it might have been dismissed as lust, but at close inspection, there was no lust there, no anger either. Careful to be inconspicuous, the Polihexian sought out the faceplates of every security-mechanism, all their faceplates may as well have been mirror images, or the faceplates of statues. On one mech, the expression might have been dismissed, but on so many... Even more worrying, were the number of security mechanisms stationed throughout the private party.

 

“I see it,” Jazz hissed. “Not good. There's too many of'em to be anythin' innocent.”

 

“I believe we will find the mechanisms gathered to be all those in position of influence in varying levels of Rodion,” Prowl theorized. “We have been invited because it would be all too tempting to the Decepticons to have a reprogrammed celebrity at their disposal.”

 

“Slag,” the saboteur swore. “We don't need to just get outta here, we need to break up this orgy.”

 

With curious optics glancing in their direction with increasing frequency, Jazz knew they had to do more the blend in. Leaning back against the wall, he took Prowl's servos and drew him over. Seeming to understand what Jazz wanted, the tactician twisted around, throwing a leg over the Polihexian's before settling onto his lap. He draped an arm over Jazz's shoulders, as the saboteur looped his arm around the Praxian's back. Prowl leaned his faceplates in, as if to nuzzle Jazz's neckplates. The Polihexian felt his spark leap in his chassis. Even on edge as he was given their dire situation, this pose was that much too intimate.

 

“That would be wise,” the Praxian agreed. His soft ventilations tickled Jazz's neck cables. “We cannot force our way out, or otherwise take on the guards. We are hopelessly outnumbered.”

 

“Do you get the vibe that Legonis is in on it?” Jazz asked, keeping his upper processors on the task at hand, forcing himself to keep a clear helm, he cupped the back of the tactician's helm with his free servo.

 

“I believe he is a Decepticon, yes,” Prowl confirmed. “We need to create a distraction, resulting in the total evacuation of this building.”

 

“Without gettin' noticed,” the Polihexian amended.

 

“The washracks are likely unsuitable for our use,” the tactician replied. “None of the guests I have witnessed visit it have returned thus far. It is possible that the orgy continues in there, but perhaps not.”

 

“Not good,” Jazz said. “Alright, got any ideas.”

 

“A fire strikes me as a suitable distraction,” Prowl replied.

 

“Tell me what your thinkin' of,” the saboteur asked. “I'm all outta incendiary devices.”

 

“Drink your engex,” the Praxian ordered, and he loosened his arm from Jazz's neck, and slid off his lap, and settled on his knees front of the Polihexian. “When you have finished, give me your flute.”

 

J azz kept his optics on the room as he did as Prowl ordered. Knowing what their positions would suggest, the Polihexian played up the image, and slowly stroke his partner's helm as he drank the  blue  intoxicating fuel. He was in no danger of becoming overcharged, of course.  Neither of them had disengaged their fuel intake moderation chips. With his optics on the room, and the mechanisms mingling  and interfacing throughout it,  Jazz could not see what the tactician was up to, though he heard Prowl rifling through his subspace before  fiddling with something . 

 

Once the saboteur finished his drink, he casually lowered his servo, flute in servo. His partner took it without a speaking a glyph. Prowl did not say anything until he finished whatever he had been doing, and stood before joining Jazz back on the lounge. One of the flutes in his servos, the one the Polihexian had just drained, contained a small amount of of clear liquid. Given the care with which the Praxian was holding that flute, Jazz knew it was dangerous. A faint smell caught the saboteur's attention and he looked down at the flute.

 

“Acid,” Jazz said, with genuine awe. “What made you think of breaking open a couple of your acid pellets?”

 

“When I was detained in the Institute, I used to fantasize means to escape,” Prowl explained. “This was one I thought over regularly, except I had not access to my rifle, nor my acid pellets.”

 

“Fragging brilliant,” the Polihexian said as he vented a sigh of relief. “You're gonna need a distraction.”

 

Both mechs turned their attention to the room. J azz  leaned into Prowl, taking care not to knock the flute, and held the Praxian to his side,  as they continued to speak in whispers .  As if he had been waiting for the opportunity, one of the band members,  a minibot, ho p ped from the stage, and leaving his band mates to play on  be hind him,  jogged towards the disguised Autobots. 

 

“Maestro!” The mech exclaimed. “It is such an honour to meet you. I'm Tusks... I'm sure this is very forward... and umm.... inconvenient... But my band and me would be so honoured if you'd do a set with us.”

 

“What do you say, love?” Folgare asked. “Think you can manage without me for a bream?”

 

“I will be listening to your every cord,” Pantera replied.

 

Playing might have been low on his list of things to do this dark-cycle but getting reprogrammed or killed were both lower. Stealing a quick kiss, to keep their covers convincing, Jazz rose and followed Tusks towards the stage. It was a welcome escape from the faux-intimacy with Prowl in the end. The Polihexian had been more than half afraid that they were actually going to be forced to interface in order to maintain their cover.

 

The small orange mech was all but bubbling over with excitement,  and h is enthusiasm actually helped to reduce Jazz's own unease at the prospect of performing. As they reached the stage, the rest of the band stopped their song mid bar, and very literally jumped with joy. Their  joy was contagious.  Jazz found himself smiling, in spite of himself.

 

“I only have a cithara with me,” he explained once the band members calmed.

 

“That'll be perfect for the _Fading Light,_ ” Tusks cheered. “We all now it.”

 

“I always loved that one,” Folgare said. It was a Polihexian ballad, tragic and sparking breaking.

 

“Maestro, are you going to play for us?” Legonis asked as he walked up to the stage. Dented cables on his neck, and paint transfers on his frame suggested that he had been an active participant of his own orgy. 

 

“Tusks here asked, and I didn't want to disappoint,” the Polihexian replied, ruefully. 

 

“That is fabulous!” The lord clapped his servos together. “Thank you, Maestro Tusks, for cajoling Maestro Folgare.”

 

“My pleasure, my lord!” Tusks replied, bowing. When Legonis left inform his guests/victims of the impromptu performance, the minibot musician murmured with disbelief: “No one's ever called me Maestro!”

 

“You've earned it,” Folgare said, nudging the minibot gently. “I've been enjoying your group all dark-cycle.”

 

The band members grinned with the praise, clapping their de-facto leader on the back, and thanking him profusely for having the courage to invite their idol on stage with them. Each of the band members hand an instrument alt mode, so Jazz stood at the centre of the stage, with them forming a 'U' around him. Just as he had hoped, every mechanism in the room had come to gather close to the stage, even the security and servers had been unable to resist, much to his and Prowl's good fortune. Jazz made optic contact with Prowl, as the Praxian stood off to the side at the back of the crowd. The tactician ought not to have any issue slipping away to start his fire, so long as their luck held.

 

“Good dark-cycle, everyone,” the Polihexian said, his voice effortlessly carried through the large room. “I hope you have been enjoying the good fuel, the good music, and the... good company I have. The fine musicians that have been serenading you all dark-cycle invited me to join them for a song... I couldn't resist, but have pity on me, it's been vorns since I've played for such a grand audience.”

 

As he strum the first notes, joining in harmony with the quartet, Jazz had his optics on the crowd. Prowl was already slipping away, his target was some exposed wires less than tidily hidden by a piece of the draping mesh lining the ballroom. When they had chosen the wires, having guessed that they ledto the chandeliers. In the rush to renovate this room, the panels had been mis-cut, leaving wires loose at the base of the wall. It was a rare thing for the master saboteur to not be the one doing the sabotaging, and it made him uneasy. He trusted the Praxian to do his part of course, but he could only hoped that Prowl was not maimed in the processes. All optics remained on the stage, and taking his cue, Jazz sang:

 

“Come lay with me, as the skies grow dark, as your weary spark can't bear to be. Let me carry your grief, let me your relief. Come lay with me...”

 

***

 

There was something deeply satisfying about fulfilling this younglinghood fantasy. The acid pellets had broken open exactly as Prowl had once imagined they would, and he had managed to do it all without being splashed with acid. Though escape had been hopeless at the Institute, here at least, there was a high probability of success. While he trusted Jazz to alert him if any mechanisms attention turned in his direction, the former Enforcer still kept his optics, and his doors tuned to the rooms occupants. The stakes were as high as they could ever be, and over confidence could be lethal.

 

He sat on the lounge that further concealed his target, and carefully leaned over to get a better look at the wiring. There was no delaying it, and the tactician did not dare ventilate as he tipped the flute containing the acid onto the wires, and watched for a nanoklik as it began to eat through its insulation. Following quickly, Prowl poured the remainder of the engex in his flute on the tapestry. Like all energon, engex was very flammable. As the Praxian stood, he tossed the tapestry over the wires as the acid ate the rest of the way to the wires themselves. Moving as rapidly but quietly as possible, Prowl rejoined the crowd. He stopped at the edge of the crowd just in time for the engex soaked tapestry to ignite, and the wires to short as they burst into flame.

 

The results were dramatic as the remaining acid itself combusted, and the fire immediately began travelling up the wires to the ceiling, at an alarming speed. In nanokliks, the chandeliers themselves shorted, and the room descended into black. Whatever the mesh decorating the walls was made off, it was highly flammable and more and more of it was burning. Only the light from the growing fire lit the room. Mechanisms around Prowl shrieked with alarm as the fire continued to spread. Sprinklers dropped from the ceiling, starting to suppress the exposed flames, but they were minimally effective for the flames spreading within the wall itself.

 

“My friends, we'd better get out of here!” Jazz, as Folgare, hollered over the din. “No shoving, we don't want anyone to get hurt!”

 

Prowl waited for Jazz to jump off the stage with the rest of the band before following the crowd to one of the exits. The reprogrammed security-mechanisms made no attempt to halt the fleeing party-goers, or to combat the flames, they were in just as big of a hurry to escape. Despite the joors that had past since they had entered the party, when the Autobots exited the building, media mechanisms were there, snapping image-captures of the fleeing elite. Occupants of the higher floors poured into the streets as well, and soon the street and sidewalk in front of the towering building was packed shoulder to shoulder with anxious mechanisms. Sirens signalling emergency response teams sounded closer and closer, yet they were barely audible over the din.

 

Once on scene, firefighters took control, urging everyone to step back from the building as they raced inside to face the fire. Before long the party guests were driving off, having had enough excitement, and the less esteemed company of the workers who had evacuated from the offices situated on the higher levels of the building. The Autobots lingered for a couple of breams longer, wanting neither to be the first to leave nor the last to leave. As they were finally turning to make their escape, Lord Legonis intercepted them, looking dejected, even a little afraid. Prowl dipped his doorwings to the lord, and beside him Jazz crooned sympathetically.

 

“I don't know what happened,” Legonis said. “Please accept my apologies.”

 

“No need for that, I'm sure none of this was your fault,” Folgare replied, his field oozed sympathy. “I'm grateful everyone got out in one piece.”

 

“Yes, yes,” the lord bemoaned. “What a disastrous dark-cycle.”

 

“When they've sorted this out, and everything's repaired, you'll put on an even better party,” the musician said, smiling reassuringly. “And I hope to be invited.”

 

“Of course!” Legonis replied, raising himself back to his full height, some lost confidence already returning. “Please enjoy the rest of your dark-cycle, and your stay in Rodion.”

 

“Thank you,” Folgare said. “I think I need a soak in the oil baths after this though, I hope the rest of your dark-cycle is peaceful, my lord.”

 

“Yes... yes, you as well,” the lord waved them off.

 

Though they did not anticipate an Enforcer chase, both Autobots were on guard as they drove from the Rodion Heights back to the hotel. Their plan had worked, however and at no point did any Enforcers, or any mechanisms at all, take interest in their presence. Prowl did have one concern, however. If there were any security cameras in the ballroom, his activities might have been recorded, and if that was the case, their covers, and even their lives were in jeopardy.

 

“It is possible that I was recorded setting that fire,” Prowl said via the comm. “Despite what Legonis insisted

 

“I've gotcha covered,” Jazz assured him. “When we get back to the hotel, I'll let myself into the building's security feed 'n make sure there's nothin' there. Buildin' outta be empty for joors. Should have plenty of time.”

 

“Understood,” the Praxian replied.

 

“We do got a problem though,” the saboteur said. “My bug's tellin' me someone's in our suite. It's a little late for housekeeping.”

 

“Can you access the feed?” Prowl asked.

 

“Doin' just that,” Jazz replied. In a klik, he had the identity of their unwelcome guest. “Looks like the purple fellow followin' Legonis. Thought he disappeared into the washracks, guess I was wrong.”

 

“How do you wish to proceed,” the tactician asked as his tactical systems rushed to absorb, and account for this new information. If the mech was their to ambush them, they would have to break their cover, and to take shelter elsewhere.

 

“He's on his way out,” the Polihexian replied. “Think he left us a present.”

 

Though his own surveillance devices had alerted to their intruder leaving, the Polihexian was less than inclined to take a stupid chance. The green femme was happy to escort them to their suite, as she carried with her a tray of engex, tart gels, and other treats. Eager to earn a handsome tip, she open the door to their suite with her own card, and carried the tray all the way into their suite, before leaving it on the table in front of the lounge both mechs had come to favour. No one attack, no traps were triggered, and both mechs vented a sigh of relief. Just as the femme had to have hoped, she received a generous tip for her trouble, and she was was quick to leave her prestigious guests to their pleasure. Prowl waited as Jazz quickly scanned the room.

 

“We're gonna have to keep the act goin' into the berthroom,” Jazz warned, over the comm. “Gettin' signals that it's transmittin', audial only. You can “spot” the bug in the light-cycle, security expert.”

 

Switching for vocal communications, Jazz spoke as Folgare, with an especially seductive tone: “You were suite to indulge me back there.”

 

“I only want to make you happy,” Prowl replied as Pantera. Speaking soft and low, he hoped he came off as emotive enough.

 

“You do,” the musical spy crooned. “Always, my love. I'd thought a nice oil bath would do the trick after that debacle but I think I have a better idea.”

 

“What would you like?” The Praxian asked.

 

“It's not what I would like,” Folgare replied, chuckling. “Although I'll like it very well. No, it's about what you would like. I think you deserve a treat. Let's take our dessert into the berthroom. The lounge is tempting, but I think you'll be quite exhausted once I'm done with you, and I wouldn't want to hurt your pretty doorwings.”

 

“Please,” Pantera replied. Acting as though he was in a hurry to receive his “reward”, Prowl picked up the tray, and promptly took it into what had been acting as Jazz's berthroom. Before he followed, Jazz paused at the keypad next to the suites door, and activated its strongest encryption. It was meant to signify to staff that they occupants did not want to be disturbed. The saboteur had tweaked it to an even stronger encryption at the beginning of their stay. It would not be coming off this setting for the rest of their stay. Once they were both in the berthroom, Jazz pulled mid-grade from his subspace, and handed a cube to Prowl.

 

“Let's store the engex 'n drink some real fuel,” he suggested. “'N eat some of the gels. We could use the added minerals.”

 

“I concur,” Prowl replied. He was keenly aware that he was sitting on a berth with a mech he considered particularly attractive, with a mech he had mimicked intimacy with just a joor early. His sensory grid was on edge, and the Praxian had to hold back a whole frame shiver. Drinking the mid-grade filled his tank, and steadied his frame. The prospect of recharging in the same berth as this mech was alarming.

 

“Got access to the Legonis' security feed,” Jazz said after drinking his own cube in total silence. “We're clear on that end. Got access to the bug's signal, it's transmitting on a private channel, looks to be Legonis'.”

 

“The odds suggest that Legonis wishes to observe our presence, likely out of curiosity, rather than to capture as Autobot spies,” the tactician replied.

 

“That's my bet,” the Polihexian concurred He picked up a gel tart and tossed it into his mouth, after he had chewed, he said: “But we won't chance it. Once you “find” the bug tomorrow, we're gonna check out. Then we're gonna hit the warehouse district.”

 

“I think that would be wise,” Prowl replied, and he reached for a gel of his own. “Should the operation be as complex, and as large as I fear, we will not be able to dismantle it on our own, but if we can identify it, assistance from Iacon could then easily called.”

 

“Hate to fight the generals for this, but you're right,” Jazz agreed. “Won't do any good if we get ourselves slagged tryin' to take on a grids worth of 'Cons.”

 

“I had the same thought,” the Praxian said. Though his tank was uneasy, Prowl ate the gel he had selected, he did not even taste it.

 

They would have to recharge in the same berth. The prospect was distinctly displeasing to the tactician, not for anything Jazz had done or would do, but because of what it would for he himself to do. As strategist, he was compelled to go over every detail of the party, and the rest of the mega-cycle. He sought out every mistake, and every smart decision in order as he compiled a mission report for his own records. With Legonis' obvious involvement with the Decepticons, the situation in Rodion was all the more grave. There was no hope of enlisting the city-state's militia for assistance with the Decepticons, and there was no calling in even a moderate number of Autobots without triggering a catastrophe. Hanging in the air remained the question of where Tread Bolt and Scrounge were, and what had become of them?

 

Distracting his focus from these important questions and details was the scene from the Dockyards. There had been no one there, and yet Prowl's processor could not let go of the idea that Barricade could have been, could still be laying in wait. It was foolish, but the Praxian could not quash these fears, no matter how many times he cancelled the thought trains. His ATS had hooked its proverbial claws in that question as well, and it looped through Prowl's processor again and again because even if Barricade was not in the Dockyards or in Rodion at all, he was still out there, and Prowl was not foolish enough to believe the mech was done with him.

 

“Up for recharge?” Jazz asked, drawing the tactician's focus outward again. “Think we outta get an early start.”

 

“That would be wise,” Prowl replied, though recharge was the last thing he actually wanted.

 

“I prefer to recharge closer to the door,” the Polihexian revealed. “Any problem for you?”

 

“No,” the tactician said.

 

It was the truth. While recharging on his side, with his doorwings angled to the door had been customary to him these last dark-cycles, it was not essential. Jazz would be in motion if anyone moved beyond the door, so any concerns of safety were nullified. Thankfully, the berth was large enough, and Prowl was able to lay on his back, with this doorwings spread flat against the berth, without bumping into Jazz. Recharging with another mech for the first time was always disconcerting, and Prowl was not comfortable recharging with his doorwings facing the Polihexian, nor did he want to actually look at the mech.

 

Laying there, listening to the other mech's ventilations, the tactician was keenly aware that his processor was not prepared to dial down to recharge, not with his tactical systems humming along as they were. Prowl did not vent in frustration, though the desire was there, as he was forced his ATS to shut down. Paranoia, fear, and arousal surged through his processor as his emotional cortex had the rare chance to operate at full power. The emotional output through him through a mental loop, and had he been standing, the Praxian felt would surely have fallen over. Suddenly, he was far too tired to deal with his disordered thoughts, and his chaotic emotions, his frame felt heavy. It always caught him by surprise how much normal sensation, like tiredness, his ATS blocked out. Drawing back to his training with the old Master, Prowl urged his emotions down, down, down. As he did so, he repeated a Diffusion mantra until finally recharge swept up and claimed him.

 

***

 

Prowl woke in a dark, a strange room. Another mech's heavy frame pinned him to the berth. Fear scorched his circuits, and he tried to throw his arms forward, to force the intruder off. A dark, familiar laugh rang out as his attempts were stifled. He could not move his arms. His legs felt paralysed, and he was all too aware as the one holding him down kicked them apart and knelt between them. No matter how he tried, Prowl could not close them or move at all. Clarity filled the Praxian's processor as he came to understand what the intruder was there for, and who he was.

 

“No,” he was not sure if he had even spoken the glyph. It felt as though even his vocalizer was frozen.

 

“This time you won't get away,” Barricade promised, his ventilations hot on Prowl's faceplates. “Just give in, open up.”

 

Though energon rose in his throat, Prowl could purge. This could not happen again. Mustering all of his strength, and training, the Praxian martial artist tried to arch his frame, tried to buck his attacker off, but his frame did not obey him, and the mental effort left him exhausted. Had he been drugged? Prowl's ventilations became panicked as it became all too clear that once again, he could not escape. Reason fled, and like a caged mechanimal, he screamed and thrashed, but it was all in his helm. Barricade's laughter seemed permeate his very being, and suddenly Prowl felt the larger Praxian's consciousness cut into his own, finally taking, finally claiming...

 

“No!”

 

End Chapter 14.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 


	15. Chapter 15

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This chapter contains recollection of non-consensual interface. If that is an issue for you, please skip this chapter. If you want an abridged, but not triggery description of the chapter's contents, please drop me a line.
> 
> I also apologize for the 6000ish words of dialogue that make up this chapter. More plotty and stuff will be happening the next chapter. 
> 
> Miss out.

Ragged ventilations woke him. Jazz listened for a couple of nanokliks before onlining his optics. The ventilations were coming from next to him in the berth. After rolling over to face the Praxian, the saboteur sat up. Prowl was still largely covered by the warming blanket, but that did not mean he was still. As Jazz watch, the recharging mech's servos clenched and unclenched, and his frame shuddered without pattern. It was a memory flux. No, the saboteur corrected himself, that was a memory purge. A bad one, Jazz thought from the way Prowl was ventilating. It was getting worse, so far as the Polihexian could guess as his partner jerked his arms, and tossed his helm. Thinking the tactician would be better off awake that stuck in this purge, Jazz reached out a servo and touched Prowl's shoulder as he said:

 

“Prowl...”

 

He did not get the chance to complete his sentence as the Praxian's arm lashed out, in one motion throwing Jazz's arm off, and striking the saboteur in the side of his faceplates. The precise slashing hit broke the Polihexian's visor and cracked his cheekplate. As his processor rang from the blow, Jazz retaliated. Unwilling to hurt his partner, but also unwilling to take anymore damage, the saboteur, fully awake unlike his adversary, lunged forward, catching Prowl's servos as they flew at him, Jazz forcefully pinned them, and the Praxian, down on the berth. Panic lashed at the Polihexian's EM field, and it nearly sent him stumbling back. Despite his desires not to damage Prowl, the mech's violent thrashing forced the saboteur to put all of his frame weight into holding him down. Prowl's optics flickered as his ragged ventilations morphed into inarticulate sounds, and finally a clear glyph.

 

“No!” The mech cried as he tried to lunge forward. Jazz pushed back, pushed his calm field into the Praxian's terror filled one, and kept him pinned. Prowl's optics flickered stronger as the mech's higher processors struggled to shake off the memory purge and to come fully online.

 

“Prowl, wake up,” Jazz ordered, almost nose olfactory ridge to olfactory ridge with the other mech. “Wake up, mech, you're safe.”

 

All fight bled from the tactician's frame. Still, Jazz hesitated to fully trust it. He stared at the other mech's faceplates as best he could through the remains of his near shattered visor. Under his servos, the cables of Prowl's wrist tensed, and then relaxed. The terror faded from his field, leaving behind an inky, emotional mess. Finally, the mech's optics lit up, and Jazz let out a long vent of relief. The danger of attack having passed, the saboteur let go of the Praxian's wrists, and climbed of the supine mech. Though free of the purge, Prowl's ventilations were still rough, his field still chaotic, and he remained on his back, staring at the ceiling.

 

“Just relax for a klik,” Jazz said. He did not receive an answer, not that he had been expecting one. The tactician was clearly shaken. Climbing out of the berth, the Polihexian left the berth room, and headed for the hab suite's energon dispenser. After filling two small cubes with warmed energon, Jazz returned to the berthroom.

 

Prowl remained on his back, still staring at the ceiling. He did not acknowledge the saboteur's return. Jazz kept silent, resting the cubes on his legs as he just listened to the Praxian's ventilations. With each one he counted, the other mech's field quieted that much more. After nearly a bream, his ventilations were even, and his EMF close to its normal silence. Finally, Prowl slowly sat up, wincing as he did. Seeing the wince, and the stiff flex of the Praxian's doorwings, Jazz quickly balanced the cubes under one servo as he reached out to support Prowl's back as he sat up the rest of the way.

 

“Sorry, didn't mean to hurt you,” he said, anxiously. “Anythin' damaged, or are you just stiff?”

 

“Stiff,” Prowl replied, that single terse glyph was spoken with more emotion than Jazz thought he had yet heard from the mech. Touching as they were, the Polihexian felt the faint stirring of emotion in the tactician's field. Humiliation stirred louder and louder with each passing nanoklik.

 

“Stiff I can help with,” Jazz declared, taking note of the humiliation but not reacting to it. Laying his servo flat over the broad armour panel that concealed the Praxian's doorwing joints, slowly, he ran his palm over the panel covering the stressed joints, sending low magnetic pulses out as he did. It only took a few pulses before Prowl's doorwings dipped, discomfort already fading.

 

“I believe I find that trick more impressive than your ability to climb walls,” the tactician said, tone more controlled, but not so flat as he favoured. His exhaustion was evident with every glyph.

 

“It comes in handy,” the Polihexian declared. Confident that his partner was upright, and no longer in pain, he retracted his arm, lifted one of the cubes and held it out to Prowl. “Warmed energon.”

 

“I recall Bluestreak and Smokescreen's caretakers giving them this when they were in distress,” Prowl replied, taking the proffered cube, and eyeing it almost curiously.

 

“No one ever made them for you?” Jazz asked.

 

“No,” the one glyph reply weighed heavily on the saboteur, and he mentally cursed his clumsy question, the Praxian's kin and caretakers.

 

“You kin suck slag,” he declared. “It's not a miracle cure, or nothin' but I always found it comfortin'.”

 

“Thank you,” Prowl replied. His doorwings remained dipped, whether it was guilt, exhaustion, or something else, the Polihexian could not know. “I apologize for the damage I caused.”

 

“My fault,” Jazz dismissed the apology with a wave of his servo. “I wouldn't've woken a rechargin' op like that, I know better. Shoulda treated you the same.”

 

“I am pleased to have been woken all the same,” the Praxian said, and he cautiously sipped at his energon. Jazz did the same, keeping a careful optic on his teammate. He had seen reactions like that before, terrible things happened to captured ops, torture at times being the least of it. Some hideous slag had happened to this mech, more than he even already revealed, and the saboteur was uncertain as to how he ought to, or even if he ought to address it. For the moment, he opted for silence.

 

With his cube emptied, Jazz set it aside on the berth, and detached his visor. The the remaining optical crystal was covered with spider cracks, a few shards were scattered on the berth. Fully aware how sharp the crystal could be, he carefully picked up every broken piece and dropped them into his empty cube. It was not until he was done cleaning up the broken crystal that Jazz realize Prowl was watching him, specifically his faceplates.

 

“Don't worry about it,” the Polihexian ordered. “I got other visors 'n it'll only take a klik or two with a plating re-generator to fix my cheekplate.”

 

“Nonetheless...” the tactician said.

 

“Nonetheless nothin',” Jazz interrupted. “Prowl, you weren't tryin' to hurt me. That's all that matters.”

 

For his part, the Praxian did not look convinced. If the tables had been turned, if Jazz had hurt Prowl in a similar setting, and a similar way, he thought the tactician would be gracious. The mech held himself to a standard unattainable to most mechanisms, and not necessarily attainable to even himself. There was, unfortunately nothing Jazz could think to say to ease the other mech's conscience. In truth, Prowl's conscience was not the saboteur's priority. It was clear as crystal that the tactician was discomfited, likely in large part because Jazz had witnessed his memory purge. This was where the Polihexian's priorities lay.

 

“You don't need to tell me anythin',” the saboteur said at last. “You got nothin' to be ashamed of, that purge I mean. They happened. But... look, you don't owe me slag, but maybe it'd help?”

 

“I consented,” it was Prowl's turn to interrupt. He vented a long sigh, and rotated his empty cube with his servos. “In principle, at least, for all that my consent was worth.”

 

“Your headmech ordered you,” Jazz filled in the gap. “That's what Smokescreen said.”

 

“He was correct,” the Praxian confirmed, his field almost visibly simmered around him, though his emotions were almost too muted to detect. “My protestations were dismissed as irrelevant, not without merit, simply as irrelevant. I was informed as to who I was to kindle with, and where I was meant to meet the mech. I had never seen, let alone spoken to Barricade, but he knew of me, somehow. If I had been involved with a mech at the time, I would have outright refused that order, but I was not, and he seemed to have known it. Windbreaker had never hinted to any knowledge of my romantic relationships previously, but I suppose he must have known.”

 

“Chromedome,” the saboteur offered. Prowl actually frowned when that designation was spoken.

 

“Gossip travels as quickly amongst the Autobots as it does amongst the Enforcer, I see,” Prowl's version of a grimace was subtle down turn in his brow ridge, and the clenching of his jaw. “Yes, Chromedome was one of my poorer choices, a repeated mistake, unfortunately. Back then, however he was called Tumbler.”

 

“When'd he change it to Chromedome?” Jazz asked. It was a detail about the mnemosurgeon that Rewind had never mentioned.

 

“After Mach, the first of his Conjunx Endurae,” the tactician explained. “They met when we were still involved, courted when we were still involved, and Tumbler only actually severed our relationship when they were discussing performing the Rites. They relocated to Iacon so that Chromedome could further his mnemosurgery studies, thus earning him the designation change.”

 

“How many Conjunx Endurae has he had?” The Polihexian asked uneasily. He thought again to Rewind, and what being cheated on would do to the small mech.

 

“Four, I believe,” Prowl said. “Three when I knew him.”

 

“The forth is the creation of a friend of mine,” Jazz replied. Prowl flicked his doorwings, and rolled his shoulders.

 

“He will love him to his death,” the Praxian reassured him, with a long intake and vent. “Chromedome falls in love quickly, and loves perhaps obsessively. He has been unlucky. Mach, Pivot, Scattergun all perished.”

 

“What about you?” The saboteur asked. “He cheated on you. You sayin' he didn't love you?”

 

“Chromedome loved the idea of me,” Prowl explained, with a slow flare to his doorwings, and a vaguely rueful expression. “The reality was less palatable. He loved the acclaim, the connections being involved with me, both as an Enforcer partner and as a romantic one earned. He found _me_ frustrating, even distasteful.”

 

“But he came back to you?” Jazz frowned.

 

“He does not suffer grief well,” the tactician said. His customary monotone had returned, and his field had grown silent. The flashes of emotions that had crossed his faceplates halted now too. Jazz guessed that the ATS was back up to full power. “With each loss, he performed mnemosurgery on himself, eliminating all memories of his lost Conjunx Endurae.”

 

“Your fraggin' with me,” the Polihexian gasped.

 

“Inevitably, after the next loss, he would return to Praxus, to me, having forgotten why he had ever left,” Prowl went on to explain. “I was foolish enough to take him back, but only once.

 

“After which one did you bud with Smokey?” Jazz asked.

 

“Mach,” the Praxian replied. “Unfortunately Mach met with an industrial accident only a decade after they bonded. By that point I had budded. Chromedome was enraged when he returned. He had left his memories of his training, and of the change to his designation, but nothing as to the end of our relationship, or of his infidelity. So far as he was concerned, I had been unfaithful. He did not like having the reality thrown back in his face. His behaviour, his removal of his own memories alarmed me, and while he hinted at rekindling our romance, I declined. I continued to work in metaforensics until near the end of my carrying. He returned to the Enforcer, almost immediately after he had returned Praxus, and though I had rebuffed his romantic overtures, Chromedome accepted being assigned as my partner. I was often without Enforcer partners, it was a role few were tempted to fill. The knowledge that I was carrying another mech's creation, that I had rebuffed him, it caused his inevitable distaste for me to return quickly, and he had gone again before Smokescreen emerged. Truthfully, I was grateful at the time to be rid of him. Working with him was straining.”

 

“No fraggin' kiddin',”the saboteur sneered. “Don't blame you a bit. He turned up again when Smokey was a bitlet

 

“Pivot died in a collision,” Prowl nodded as he continued, as his ATS dominance failed for a brief moment. “I was... floundering after Smokescreen's emergence. Hoping for, desperate for support I allowed our relationship to rekindled. He was not supportive, not so far as I was concerned in any case. Looking back he was actually destructive. When I was intentionally keeping distant from my creation, he encouraged it so that I would spend what free time I had with him. I had very little, my focus was on the Enforcers. Eventually I would different my attention to my sparkling, only to send him before long. I imagine Smokescreen told you.”

 

“Ya,” Jazz confirmed. “He said you had a bad crash.”

 

“By that point I had had many serious crashes,” the tactician replied, grim faced, or perhaps just exhausted “That was the only one Smokescreen witnessed. My processor only felt stable when I was on an investigation.”

 

“Because you're emotions weren't involved,” the Polihexian guessed.

 

“Yes,” Prowl confirmed with a slow nod. “My glitch had stabilized in the Institution. The Diffusion master that had trained had taught me how to repress my emotions. While it was always imperfect, up until I carried my glitches were infrequent. They were near daily once Smokescreen emerged. I had been told by everyone I questioned that my procreator coding would come online and I would know all that I needed to know so far as caring for my creation went. I was told originator coding created unbreakable bonds before the creation ever emerged. They were wrong. My coding never noticeably shifted. When Smokescreen emerged, I had no idea what to make of him. In truth, I was horrified of him.”

 

“Because of Barricade?” Jazz asked, gently.

 

“I consented to interface, and to kindle,” the Praxian said. “Vicomagister Windbreaker had made it clear that my association with House Ordo hinged on kindling. While I was an accomplished investigator, a few harsh glyphs to the right audials would have seen my career in tatters. I did not believe I could survive without my House. It is something instilled in every Praxian from an early age. I allowed Barricade to interface with me, and allowed a kindling merge. He took the merge too deep, far deeper than I welcomed or was necessary for kindling. Deep as he went, he opened himself up to my inspection. He did not care a bit if I budded, that was only a ruse to trick me into merging. He wanted to tie me to him, wanted to for a bond on my spark.”

 

“By the Guiding Hand,” the saboteur swore. “You stop it. Didn't you?”

 

“I prevented a bond from forming by channelling our spark energies into kindling,” Prowl explained. “Diffusion taught me better control over my spark than most ever bother. It saved me.”

 

“Thank Primus for small favours,” Jazz sighed, whole frame sagging with relief. “You couldn't go to the Enforcers, I guess.”

 

“Because I consented to the interface, and even to the merge, no Justice would ever convict him of rape,” the tactician replied, weariness breaking the monotone. Had he also investigated cases, and seen this same result? “No prosecutor would bother to file such a charge. I had no proof of his attack, and so I kept silent.”

 

“That's utter slag,” the Polihexian said. “But I see it.”

 

“It is a reality of law enforcement,” Prowl said. “The glyph of one cannot be intrinsically believed over that of another.”

 

“'M sorry,” Jazz said, even though the glyphs felt lame and useless. “Smokey doesn't know, does he?”

 

“Smokescreen always felt so certain that I did not want him, I have never dared to give him any further proof that he was, at least at one point correct,” the Praxian explained. “I did not want him. When my coding did not trigger, I felt like a failure. When I saw my creation, even though he bore more resemblance to me, I saw Barricade. When he fussed, I heard Barricade. Though I knew it was not his fault, it could not have been, I did not want to be around him, could not bare to be, and thus was not for the whole of his newlinghood, and the first stellar-cycles of his sparklinghood. In the end I had an epiphany late one dark-cycle after an argument with Chromedome. I had abandoned my creation, as I had been abandoned. It was no less of an abandonment because I lived in the same ziggurat. I had been absent too long, however and Smokescreen was not comfortable in my presence. I did not know how to ease myself into his life, did not in fact think to ease myself in.”

 

“You didn't exactly have great role models,” the Polihexian said. “Your procreators never turned up to help, I guess.”

 

“The last contact had with either of my procreators was when I was institutionalized,” Prowl explained. “I had previously written one message a stellar-cycle, once I had learned to write, I suppose in the hopes of forming some connection. They never wrote back. I told myself that perhaps the Vicomagister had barred them from responding, but the truth is that they wanted nothing to do with me, and never had. I began writing them on an ornly basis from the Institute once it was clear that the Vicomagister was barring my release. I wrote only of my studies, never begged them to intervene on my behalf. They never had in the past, but I had hoped. After a stellar-cycle of these ornly messages, my originator replied. He wrote that my progenitor had died. He wrote that it had always hurt them to receive my messages but my progenitor had felt that it was his duty to receive them. My originator did not feel the same duty. I did not write again. If my originator is aware of the existence of Bluestreak and Smokescreen it is through other channels.”

 

“Mech, 'm sorry,” Jazz replied. “You didn't deserve that.”

 

“I did not feel my progenitor's passing,” the tactician revealed. “I realized then that I had no spark ties to any of my kin, so far as my spark and code were concerned, we were no better than strangers.”

 

It painted a hideous picture. Prowl had been discarded by his procreators, discarded by Chromedome, abused by the Vicomagister, then finally raped. No one had ever cared what he wanted or need, no one had ever acknowledged that he might need help, might want help. He could have screamed until his vocalizer shorted but they would have all been deaf to him. Had he even dared, they would have just blamed it on his glitch, and had him reprogrammed. The thoughts were ugly, and spark wrenching for Jazz, who _was_ little more than a stranger.

 

“Who's idea was it to get that ATS of yours installed?” He asked, still trying to understand how Prowl's entirely family could have been that awful.

 

“Mine,” Prowl replied. “It was an experiment, and I had learned of it by accident. The previous recipients had suffered severe processor trauma, and in each case had had the components removed. I was a reasonably capable tactician without the specialized systems, which was why I was successful in metaforensics. I thought I could do more with those components, and I thought they could actually solve the on going problem with my glitch. It never settled back to manageable levels after Smokescreen emerged, even once I sent him away. I had thought, perhaps it was the presence of my creation that was causing the glitches, but that was not the case. My glitch had simply progressed, and I could no longer control it with Diffusion techniques. Windbreaker began to speak of reprogramming, Enforcer Command began to question my stability, likely due to Windbreaker's mutterings, and Chromedome volunteered to perform the mnemosurgery himself. I went to the engineers and put myself forward as a candidate to receive the tactical upgrades.”

 

“Chromedome didn't take it well?” Jazz asked.

 

“No, he accused me of turning myself into a drone,” the tactician replied, as he shrugged his doorwings. “Mnemosurgery to the degree recommended to “treat” my glitch would have done precisely that. As long as there is a connection between my emotional cortex and my upper processors, I will have a glitch. To not have this connection would be to be no better than a drone. The side effects from the ATS to my systems were considerably more minor that anything resulting from mnemosurgery, and considerably more minor than the previous test subjects. My latent logic processor is naturally advanced, and it integrated the battle computer, and simulator with minimal issue. Having my emotional cortex suppressed due to the significant power demands of these new systems was realistically something I had been consciously doing to control my glitch since I was a youngling. It gave me a sense of stability that I had been long missing. The systems also worked as the engineers, and senior Enforcers had hoped, and I was almost immediately transferred into PETU. Chromedome did not verbally terminate our relationship but he was gone from Praxus before I was released by the medicentre.”

 

“Better off,” the saboteur rumbled. It earned him just the faintest of smiles, a nanoklik's upturn to Prowl's lipplates. Was his emotion cortex still in upheaval or had he tweaked the ATS to a lower power level?

 

“Yes, I believe you are correct,” Prowl said. “I did not base my decision to have the ATS installed based on how other perceived me; I had it installed based on my need to survive. Perhaps, I should have considered those ramifications. Smokescreen was deeply disturbed. He may have gotten used to me, had he wished to but by that point he had been raised by others most of his life, Barricade had appeared, and his progenitor always was exactly what I was not. He had no reason to want to acclimatize to me.”

 

“Why did you let Barricade stick around?” Jazz asked. “Because Smokey wanted him?”

 

“I had convinced myself that my feelings, even my memories of his conception were faulty,” the Praxian explained. “That was what I had been told, in so many glyphs, for so many stellar-cycles. I had convinced myself that while unpleasant, I had consented to the interface. On the surface Barricade appeared to be a more effective procreator, to any outsiders, though he was lacks on discipline. I thought if I ordered him off, he might seek custody and... at one point that would have been a flux come true.”

 

“But you loved Smokescreen,” the Polihexian said. “You just needed your glitch stabilized enough to feel it.”

 

“Yes, yes that is precisely it,” Prowl sighed. “Smokescreen physically recoiled when near me. I have never been able to balance my systems in order to have a consistently responsive field. It takes very little emotional input to make me feel vulnerable to a crash. By now it has become a defence, and perhaps a crutch, no one is able to guess what I might be thinking based on what I am feeling. Smokescreen gravitated towards his progenitor. His caretakers, dismissed at this point, had never taught him boundaries, and I insisted on them, Barricade had none, naturally he was the preferred procreator.”

 

Jazz said nothing. What Prowl was saying matched what Smokescreen had told him already. It did not paint either of them in an all that negative light when you listened to it from both their vocalizers. His own upbringing had been unusual. Most mechanism would be aghast to learn that he had been raised to spy, to steal, and to kill as a mechling. But that had been the business of the family, of the Fellowship, and his procreators, and his community as a whole had largely been loving, and they had always reached out to help any member who had been struggling. How much better off might Smokescreen and Prowl both have been if some mechanism had actually reached out and lent the originator a helping servo?

 

“Eventually I decided to draft a custody agreement, using evidence from Smokescreen's school, where Barricade was only able to take Smokescreen to specific locations and activities,” the Praxian continued his story as Jazz listened and ruminated on what he was learning. It surprised him that Prowl was opening up to him like this, but at the same time it really did not. The mech was tired, down to his spark, tired enough that those tactical systems were not telling him to be silent. “They snuck off together often, deviated from their planned activity often, and I became ruthless in ensuring I knew where Smokescreen was at all times, to the point of surveilling them frequently. Barricade decided quickly enough that it was not worth the effort, and he stopped turning up to take Smokescreen out. I was satisfied with the results, but of course Smokescreen was devastated. I attempted to engage him in activities, in conversation, largely I was unsuccessful but our relationship did improved. It was stilling improving when the Vicomagister ordered me to bud again, of course with Barricade.”

 

“Did he threaten you with something?” The saboteur asked. “To make you go?”

 

“We argued, but it came to nothing,” Prowl explained. “He dismissed my concerns not only of my own ineffectual procreating, but of Barricade's motives. I could not win against him, and I had not yet built up the resolve to chose my own needs over the demands of my House. I went because I hoped I could reason with Barricade. I was wrong. He threatened me, not with harm to my frame, he threatened to expose my own questionable dealings.”

 

“Questionable?” Jazz asked. “You strike me as bein' by the book.”

 

“I have made deals with monster in order to achieve the best outcome,” the tactician replied. “Monsters often know best how to catch the greater monsters.”

 

“Sounds like my business,” the Polihexian said. “Nothin' black 'n white, everythin's grey.”

 

“That summarizes it well enough,” Prowl agreed casting Jazz a long look. “I went with him, knowing full well what he was going to attempt. It was rape, it could be called nothing else, and I knew precisely what he was going to do. I told myself I had only to bare it, and I would be able to ensure that he was never near me or my creation again. I should have asked for a court order to bar him from contact, but I had been to prideful, and truthfully, I never expected that the Vicomagister would think to suggest that I bud again, let alone with Barricade. I miscalculated.”

 

“And he tried to bond you again,” Jazz read between the lines.

 

“And again I channelled our spark energies towards kindling,” the Praxian said. “At first I tried to twist our energies into an overload he did his best to divert this, and he was going to deep, and I... I dug through his spark, through to his memories. It became clear that if I did not do something with our spark energies as they to a peak, we were going to be bonded, so I accepted that I would have to bud, and I did. Those memories would not be enough to prosecute him for anything, but they told me where to look for evidence, and I destroyed his Enforcer career before Bluestreak emerged. I also filed in the courts for his procreator rights to be revoked. With the criminal case against him, including the aiding in the delinquency of a minor, the Justices ruled in my favour.”

 

“Smokescreen didn't take it well, did he?” the saboteur asked.

 

“No,” Prowl replied. “I did not tell him that the kindling of his brother stemmed from his progenitor's rape of my spark. I was humiliated and disgusted, and angry at my own miscalculations, and though I had originally thought I ought to speak the truth, I said only that he was not to see Barricade again. Smokescreen did not forgive me. Even when he realized what Barricade was, the fact that I conceived Bluestreak, that I was more attentive with Bluestreak was a smack in his faceplates.”

 

“'Course you didn't wanna make the same mistakes,” Jazz soothed. “But younglings ain't reasonable.”

 

“Bluestreak largely has been, but Smokescreen was not,” the tactician said. “One is like a wildfire, one is like a still pond. I do not know that I raised Bluestreak better, really. He has eerily easy. I have often thought that it is because of the turmoil he witnessed between his brother and I. My one relief is that they love each other.”

 

“Barricade went to detention in the end, I know, was it because of what you saw?” The Polihexian asked.

 

“Smokescreen snuck Bluestreak out to meet Barricade when his brother was still a small sparkling,” Prowl explained. “The location did not disturb Smokescreen, he had been desensitized in ways I had not yet learned, and am still disturbed by. Bluestreak had not be desensitized, and the meeting, and the Pit it took place in terrified him. Smokescreen did not try and stop his brother from telling me what had gone on, he knew that it was impossible. He even confessed to the precise location without serious prodding, and from there I uncovered an even more horrific side to their progenitor's activities. I also learned that the Praefectus Vigilum, and many of the elite in Praxus were complicit to many criminal enterprises, including brothels, many of whom contained underage and unwilling prostibots.”

 

“Frag,” Jazz swore. “The fraggin' chief Enforcer?”

 

“I was steamrolled from bringing charges, so I arranged a press conference outside the Hall of Justice,” Prowl revealed. “The Lord, who's own brother was a known client of one of the brothels, had no choice but to dismiss the Praefectus Vigilum. I was appointed to replace him, all were prosecuted, including the Lord's brother who took a deal in order to receive a paltry sentence.”

 

“Go Prowl,” the saboteur cheered. “You kicked aft.”

 

“I suppose,” the Praxian replied, His helm and doorwings dipped. “With that, I thought I was rid of Barricade.”

 

“You aren't?” Jazz asked. “Was that the trigger for your memory purge?”

 

“I had that memory purge because I imagined I saw Barricade in the Dockyards,” Prowl admitted, with upper lipplate curled.

 

“Hold it, you thought you saw him?” The Polihexian asked, as he sat up with a jolt. “He's out...?”

 

“He was released shortly after I took leave of the Enforcers,” the tactician revealed. “Through Windbreaker he appealed to the Justices to keep Bluestreak in Praxus, but he is not in Praxus himself. He was exiled as part of his new deal.”

 

“And you thought you saw him here,” Jazz said, almost struck dumb. “Prowl, you should've commed me!”

 

“I saw a shadow!” Prowl countered, actually sharply, and his tone took on a derisive edge. “A piece of garbage that I imagined to be him.”

 

“I don't care if you thought it's just a piece of trash,” the saboteur scolded. He reached out, took Prowl face in his servos and forced the other mech to look at him. “It could still be somethin' 'n you coulda been gone, 'n I'da had no clue. Comm me if somethin' spook you. I mean it, Prowl. I'd rather chase a shadow than lose a partner. Get me?”

 

“This is ludicrous,” the Praxian grumbled. While he did not pull his helm out of Jazz's grasp, he did look down, stubbornly, because how could it be anything but stubbornness, avoiding the Polihexian's gaze.

 

“Prowl,” Jazz repeated. “I'd rather chase a shadow, that lose you to one.”

 

“Very well,” Prowl conceded, with a flick of his doorwing, a show of irritation if there had ever been one.

 

“Good mech,” the Polihexian vented a sigh, and dropped his servos. Feeling that much for exhausted himself, he asked: “Think you might be up to recharge again?”

 

“It is worth an attempt,” the tactician replied. This time Prowl lay down on his side, his doorwing facing towards Jazz, towards the door. After observing the Praxian for several nanokliks, he reached and patted Prowl's shoulder.

 

“When we get back to Iacon, I'll see if I can track'm down,” Jazz said. “Give you some piece of processor.”

 

“Thank you,” Prowl replied, visibly sagging a little into the berth. “I would appreciate that.”

 

Recharge did not come to Jazz quickly. He was consciously aware of every ventilation, every sound Prowl made. It was not until the Praxian dropped into recharge, and did not immediately enter another memory purge, that the saboteur was finally able to really relax. Even then he lay awake, thinking about what Smokescreen and Prowl had both told him. Guilt would eat at Smokescreen if he learned what had happened to his originator, that he had ever favoured Prowl's rapist over Prowl. Whether it would be better for both of them in the long run if Smokey knew, Jazz could not really guess, and in the end, it was not for him to tell. Prowl had revealed more than he had intended, even as he had revealed so much.

 

The tactician legitimately had no clue how to process emotions, and was afraid of even the slightest up kick in his own. All he had ever been taught was to control and to repress, never to deal. It was not the ATS that had turned Prowl into an emotional cripple, and it was not even his glitch. It was also not healthy. Running those tactical systems so hot all the time must have had him burning through coolant faster than normal, probably even shorting out wires faster too. Some mechanism could have noticed and helped him, some medic or mnemosurgeon at the Institute should have. His sparklinghood caretakers should to have tried. Even the Diffusion Master had failed him.

 

Was it even possible for Prowl to learn differently now, after this many vorns and after so many traumas? Would he even be willing to try? Jazz had his doubts. The Praxian's fear of glitching, a well earned fear for certain, would most likely hold him back from taking the risk. How could saboteur even suggest tat there was nothing to fear? Of course Optimus would take care of Prowl, would see to it that he was under the care of the best medics, but if his tactician started glitching regularly, Prime would transfer the Praxian's duties to someone else, and encourage Prowl to recuperate. In turn, the Praxian would interpret this as him being discarded, demoted, even if that was not the case. The generals would mock him, the ranks too until he was forced out of the army. All in all, not a risk Prowl was going to be in a hurry to make.

 

Maybe Jazz could nudge him in that direction, given a little time. Special Ops took care of their own, and they guarded secrets better than anyone. They all had their baggage, and they all went a little weird, a little unhinged when missions went south. Sometimes they made really strange choices, Hound being a fine example, but in the end Special Ops never turned their backs on each other, ever. After this mission, Prowl was definitely an honorary op, and if anyone tried to frag with him, they would find that cheery, playful Jazz was Unicron incarnate when someone messed with his friends. He had not said this to Prowl, but Jazz was certain of one thing, if he found Barricade that slagsucker was not going to live long. That mech had earned himself a spot at the top of Meister's kill list, and it would be the saboteur's unmitigated pleasure to cross that designation off his list.

 

End Chapter 15


	16. Chapter 16

“I don't care if he ripped some glitch's arm off and fragged him with it, I need those slaggers in Rodion,” Barricade snarled as he paced. He had allowed Soundwave to install a long range comm directly into his processor before he had left on this assignment. The glitchy thing gave him processor aches, but they were worth the convenience. “Especially Swindle. Pit, especially Vortex! I've got all of two other mechs watching the operation... No I don't think the reprogrammed Enforcers count! Those bolts for processors weren't smart enough to spot us coming, you think reprogramming them made them any smarter?”

 

“Sir?” A squeaky, nervous voice dared to interrupt Barricade and he whipped around ready to separate the mech's helm from his neck. The tacky little spy shook as the angry Praxian stared him down. “Jazz is Meister.”

 

“What?” Barricade did not ask, he demanded. He enjoyed seeing the minibot flinch. Shockwave was still droning on over his long range comms, but the Praxian ignored the Empurata lord in favour of the reprogrammed minibot.

 

“Meister, the mech you want Swindle to trick is Jazz,” Scrounge explained. Seeing Barricade's impatient scowl, the minibot stammered. “Meister's just a code... He isn't real. Jazz is head of Autobot ops.”

 

“Why should I fragging care?” The Praxian asked with an impatient snarl.

 

“Because I think he's here,” the reprogrammed spy explained. He held up a datadisk, projecting a tabloid picture and article. “He's Polihexian... Mechanisms say he can change his shaped. I think this is him.”

 

“That lame musician?” Barricade sneered. “You think he's Meister?”

 

“I think he's Jazz,” Scrounge said. “He's got a... pet project, a Praxian recruit. They're way too close, you know? “Folgare” is travelling with a Praxian. Why would that a Praxian would be slumming it with a washed up Polihexian musician, especially in Rodion?”

 

“What's the Praxian's designation?” The disgraced Enforcer demanded. He lifted the minibot off the floor by the rim of his chassis. “The designation of the Autobot Praxian?”

 

“I haven't met him!” The Autobot double agent cringed and tried to go limped. “I just heard Jazz call him Smokey.”

 

“Smokescreen,” Barricade grinned, and let out a cruel bark of laughter. The image on the datadisk was next to useless. Folgare was the focus, his companion just a blur, but Barricade saw two clear details: a blue helm and a gold chevron. He dropped Scrounge unceremoniously to the ground. “Smokescreen, an Autobot.”

 

“I guess,” Scrounge squeaked. “They must be here looking for us. There are barely any operatives left. Soundwave neutralized most of them. If he thinks _we're_ his mechs, he won't just let it be.”

 

“Shut up, Shockwave,” the Praxian ignored the little spy in favour of his long range communication. “Patch me to Soundwave, will ya? Or maybe you should just ask the TIC if a shot of catching Autobot Jazz is worth releasing the Combaticons.”

 

“What do you want me to do, sir?” The reprogrammed minibot asked, timidly. “I could bring in Jazz...”

 

“You?” Barricade laughed. “You're useless. Get out of my sight. If Swindle has use for you _he_ can call you in.”

 

Barricade did not watch the minibot leave. The idea of fragging him was considerably less appealing now than it had been mega-cycles earlier. Scrounge was such a pathetic mechanism, he would break before one interface was over. No, the Praxian Decepticon preferred his partners, or rather his victims to be sparked from stronger stuff. On the surface, Prowl had appeared delicate. He was, after all a noblespark, and a dataslug pusher, but did that mech ever have SPARK. Both times Barricade had tried to bond them, the tactician had pushed him back, beat him back with his very spark. Though sparking him up with Smokescreen had worked out well enough, Prowl had been sidetracked from the investigation into Strife's murder and Barricade's little side business had not been uncovered. Binding would have put the clever investigator at his mercy, never able to reveal or to investigate Barricade's dealings without the criminal knowing it. Still, for a while, the Decepticon had convinced himself that he was happier with this result, why would he want his spark tied down, right?

 

He had only decided to come around to see Smokescreen out of curiosity. What progenitor did not want to see if his mechling took after him? Then hey, the sparkling had been whip smart, and even devious at that young age, and Barricade had come up with the idea to mold Smokescreen into being his partner in crime. The thought of Prowl had never come in to it, and the Decepticon had not even thought about the other Praxian until the mech suddenly turned up, and started telling _him_ what he was allowed to do with _his_ creation. Barricade had expected that Prowl would flinch from him, shy from him or something, but the mech had ball bearings, and he never so much as twitched with Barricade got to close, but he had stared the  now-exiled Praxian down. And it had made Barricade hot.

 

U nfortunately, there had been not shoving the mech down, and fragging the Pit out of him.  Barricade had known something of Prowl's Diffusion training, and of his marksmanship. Outside of the influence of Ordo's Vicomagister, there had been no doubt in the larger Praxian's processor that the tight aft originator would have shot him in the spark if given the right provocation. Holding himself back had not cooled his desires, of course.  It had seemed like a gift from the gods or demons when Enforcer Command had assigned Prowl to PETU,  and away from metaforensics.  Barricade's racket had been secured then, but still he had not been satisfied. Maybe he had been bored with the robbery beat, but almost as soon as he had discovered Prowl's transfer, he had applied for PETU himself.  Really, it had not taken much effort to get himself signed on except that those self-righteous slaggers up in command had never see Barricade for anything more than a grunt,  not a mech of skill,  and while they had both been assigned to PETU,  originator and progenitor  had never crossed paths, Prowl had never allowed for it. The closest the obsessed mech had gotten to his quarry was hearing the mech's voice in his helm, issuing orders.  None of  those orders had ever been directed at him  specificially; Barricade had never risen beyond the rank of corporal, and so he had taken direct orders from higher ranked Enforcers. Oh that had always bristled his plating  too .

 

Listening to that cold monotone order the squads this way or that, chiding them when they went off course, Barricade had always wanted to bark back, but had never been able to. Only officers had benn allowed direct communication to the HUB, and the tactical officer manning it. Each operation, each mega-cycle that the former Enforcer had been forced to listen but never to touch, never to take, it had driven him stir crazy. When they had fragged, or more truthfully when Barricade had fragged Prowl, the mech had never made a sound, if he had had to speak, it had never been louder than that quiet monotone. Every time Barricade had heard that voice again, it had only made him want the tactician more, only made him more determined to ring a scream from Prowl's cold glossa.

 

It had taken considerable work, and the right blackmail, to force Windbreaker to  set Prowl up with him again  to . Not that the Vicomagister had given a frag if his kinsmech was sparkraped or roughed up, his resistance had lain entirely in not wanting to waste another of his House's creation ration on Prowl. His own pride, and need to maintain the appearances of his direct sparkline had broken Windbreaker down eventually. Prideful, prideful Prowl had actually though he could reason with Barricade. Ha. Barricade was a mech that got what he wanted, and he had wanted Prowl.

 

Still, he had failed to link their sparks,  and failed to make him scream. Even when the larger, more heavily armoured Praxian had made it hurt, Prowl's self-control had never wavered . No mech the Decepticon had ever merged with before or after had ever had that  kind of  control. As much as it still angered Barricade to have been fought off, the memories of that dark-cycle  continued to make  his engine rev. A mech with such a cool exterior should not have been so hot sparked.  Barricade need ed to own that spark,  bend and shape it for his own ends. He needed to claim the sharp processor behind it, and twist it too.

 

Prowl would never come willingly, and he would never come under Windbreaker's orders again either. Between their two encounters, the tactician's independence and will had grown, after the last one, it had all but exploded in Barricade's faceplates.  Maybe he had taken the mech down a peg when they had squared off in the hotel. As clever as Prowl  had thought himself to be, he had not stood a hope in convincing Barricade to leave him alone.  It had humiliated and enraged  the tactician to have his glyphs, and his sneaky dealings thrown back in his faceplates. Barricade had seen all this, felt all this in Prowl's spark. He wanted to feast on the humiliation, on the rage, and on the fear that would come when he ripped his quarry's chassis open, and claimed his spark for keeps. 

 

Barricade shook his helm, and broke from his  musings . Maybe he did not need to wait until his return to Praxus. Prowl would come for Smokescreen, if only out of principle.  There would be no luring his creation to him personally though. Smokescreen had blocked him on every level of communication, besides the mechling was a sneaky mechanism in his own right, and if a strange account tried to link up with him over the data-net, well he would not run off from his boss just to hook up with his 'genitor.

 

Soundwave would authorize the release of the Combaticons. Shockwave might have been Lord of Tarn, but he was still lower down the Decepticon food chain than Soundwave, and the telepathic spybot was not going to waste a chance to get his servos on his Autobot nemesis. The question was, how long would it take? Barricade brought the data-net up on his glitchy workstation and searched for “Folgare”. If the musician was really an Autobot spy, then he and Smokescreen  could  ha ve  been sniffing around  Polihex for an orn or more. He dimmed his optics and frowned, there was no telling how close they had gotten to finding the mnemosurgery operation. 

 

Megatron's puppet Legonis had hosted the Polihexian and his Praxian whorebot the last dark-cycle. The party, which had been a ruse to collect more “patients” for Froid to tweak, had ended early after a suspicious fire... It could have been the Autobots, or it could have been cheap construction work, everything done in Rodion was done on the cheap. They needed optics on the musician, needed them now,  just in case. If Barricade played this right, he would not need to wait for Swindle to get his servos on the Autobots, if these mechs were in fact Jazz and Smokescreen.  All he needed to do was get into their suite.

 

Smirking at his own ingenuity, Barricade reprogrammed his colour nanites back to the old Enforcer white and black.  The decals were gone, stripped from his programming by Praxian Enforcer command after Prowl discovered Barricade's side business. They were not hard to forge, not when templates were floating all over the datanet. Blackout had a steady servo, considerably more so than Brawl, so the Praxian searched out his aerial comrade. He found him  peering out the warehouse's windows, out to the empty streets. Their third teammate was watching from above in their hab suite. 

 

“Think you can help me with this?” Barricade asked, showing the rotary a template of Rodion's Enforcer decals.

 

“Sure, doesn't look hard,” Blackout replied, gesture to one of the meditechs, he ordered: “Get over here, watch the window for a bream. What are you up to, Barricade?”

 

“I need to pay a visit to the Empirium, with an Enforcer escort,” the Praxian explained. “That glitchy minibot thinks that Polihexian hack the tabloids are chattering about is his old “boss”, the Autobot spymaster.”

 

“Oh ya?” The rotary asked. “The timing matches up nice, doesn't it?”

 

“I thought so,” Barricade agreed. “I lit a fire under Shockwave's aft to get Brawl's team over here, but I'm not waiting. I'm not going to risk the Autobots sneaking off.”

 

“Think you need air support?” Blackout asked, energon lust radiating from his field.

 

“Would be great but we can't risk leaving this place unguarded,” the former Enforcer replied, regretfully. “I'll borrow some Enforcers, Froid's got them so well programmed, they'll do whatever I need.”

 

***

 

B arricade was not the boss of him. Technically, Tread Bolt was, and  t he medics were still repairing him. Scrounge really did not know what had sent the flier over the deep end, or what the mnemosurgeons, or whatever they were, were planning to do to fix him. In the back of his processor, the minibot seemed to recall Tread Bolt being a level-helmed mech, but Scrounge could not match this thought up to a clear memory. His processor still felt fuzzy from whatever the Autobots had done to him, but that would not hold the Decepticon double agent back.

 

T read Bolt had ordered Scrounge to  draw Jazz out, and the minibot was going to do just that, if only because Barricade seemed to think he could not. How, now that was the important question. Whatever these hacks were, they were not skilled medics, Froid had dismissed Scrounge's request that his comms be fixed. The lack of this fix, and the lack of Tread Bolt beating him into complacency, had kept the minibot lurking around the warehouse base. He could not call for help if Jazz got wind of his true loyalties, he could  not even make contact with the saboteur. 

 

S o what did he do? Scrounge could not well run up to the hotel and confront him faceplates to faceplates,  no he needed to lure Jazz out into the open, into a trap.  He could do it on his own, whatever Barri c ade thought, whatever Tread Bolt  even thought. The flier had planned on being the one to actually catch the Autobot, but Scrounge was certain he could do it, all on his own. It was only a matter of getting the Polihexian operative to come to him. 

 

A n idea flit across his processor, and the minibot spy almost cheered aloud at his own brilliance. All he needed was a communicube. Of course! Why had he not thought about the cubes mega-cycles ago?  Scrounge shook his helm, it was because his processor was still fuzzy. He really did not understand how he and Tread Bolt could have been captured, and tortured by the Autobots, and yet Jazz was supposed to want to rescue him? That's when it hit him, mnemosurgery. This was how the Autobots had made he and his superior loyal to them. This was why Scrounge remembered going on ops with Bumblebee, why he remembered refueling, and just hanging out with the Autobot communications specialist, Blaster.

 

It explained everything! Froid  was just a mnemosurgeon, not a medic, same with all of his team, naturally he had no clue how to do real repairs, like those Scrounge needed on his comms. The minibot finally understood  what the se mechs were doing, working on Tread Bolt for joors at a time, here and there. They were trying to reverse the Autobots mnemosurgery. The Autobots were using mnemosurgery, like the Senate had with the Institute during Nova Prime's reign, they were turning captured, loyal Decepticons into Autobot agents. Not this Decepticon!

 

He would pay Jazz back, pay all the Autobots back for trying to turn him into their slave. Scrounge searched through his subspace, but even its hidden compartments were empty. There should have been rations,  a pair of blasters , communicubes... and... and  _things_ ! Confused, and his helm beginning to throb, the minibot wandered into the mnemosurgery clinic. It was bustling with activity as Froid and his team worked on a half dozen mechs. The sight made Scrounge's processor pinch painfully, but he forced himself to think through the pain. These mu st have been more Decepticons, captured and turned by the Autobots.

 

“What do you want?” Froid demanded, as he looked up, his mnemosurgery claws buried in a brawny mech's helm.

 

“I... I need my kit,” Scrounge stuttered. “My field kit. A couple of blasters, some rations, communicubes.”

 

“Ah, that junk,” the mnemosurgery replied. “It's over there in the purple box on the shelf. 

 

“Why do you have it?” The minibot asked as he went to retrieve his possessions.

 

“We couldn't very well leave you armed when we were treating your injuries,” Froid said, in a tone that suggested he thought he was speaking to a fool. “Think of the damage Tread Bolt did.”

 

“Oh, right,” Scrounge replied, sheepishly. He dug through the box, returning each of piece of his field kit into its correct spot in his subspace. There were a few gadgets he did not recognize and he turned them over in his servos. Looking over to Froid, he asked: “What are these?”

 

“No idea,” the mnemosurgeon did not bother looking up from his work when he answered.

 

Scrounge turned the  _thing_ over in his servo when a memory, damaged and largely obscured by static leapt on his HUD. It was a EMP disruptor. Depending on the range it was set off at, it could either paralyse the target, or fry his comms. Maybe this was the thing that had shorted his. The minibot shrugged to himself, it did not matter. This is what he would use on Jazz and his Praxian pet agent. A plan coming together in his processor, Scrounge stored the last of his possessions and left the  clinic space, and returned to his sparse quarters. He had a communicube to prepare.

 

***

 

I acon, for all it had been home for vorns before Hound had taken the mission in Vos, it felt unfamiliar, even foreign now. Vos had been a lot more like the Crystal City than Iacon would ever want to be,  and the servus-frame had called the Seeker state home for vorns . I acon  would take time to get used to  before it could really feel like home again, if it ever did . Though Thundercracker and Skywarp had made no attempt to chase after him and Silverbolt  yet , the  originator felt continuously on edge, as though at any klik Skywarp was going to appear out of the ether and steal Silverbolt away. Hound did not fear that he himself would be botnapped, no had they wanted him, they would have gone after him that moment he escaped the Aerie.  They would never have let him escape at all . 

 

Not that they had been in Vos when Hound had made his escape. The  pair  had not even bothered to be present for the emergence of their  first  creation. Murder and destruction  for the Decepticons  had become their sole purpose once the Winglords, nicknamed the Rainmakers by the victims of their destructive mods, had thrown their joined loyalty in with Megatron. When Hound had arrived in Vos, his mission had been to observe and to undermine Decepticon attempts to win the city-state. He had met  thee  mismatched pair of Seekers, one quiet and thoughtful, the other one loud and chaotic. It had come as a huge surprise to Hound when he had learned that Thundercracker was  a creation of the Winglords, although  not the favoured  one. His failure to form and to lead a trine had seen to it that the Seeker prince was kept out of any official Aerie governance.  Hound had thought them as the key to undermining the Decepticons.

 

At first, they had seemed dubious of the Decepticons, even after the Rainmakers had aligned Vos to Megatron's cause. A part of Hound had remained with them,  and been with them at all ,  in  hopes that  he could get them to reason with Thundercracker's progenitors,  and another part of him had remained because he had loved them. Once he had budded,  something had suddenly, irreversibly changed, and t hey had taken him from their modest home to the Aerie itself where Hound had been all but locked in the harem  with the housemechs kept by the Vosian ruling family.  Instead of treating him like an equal, as they had before, they had begun to treat him like a thing.

 

Maybe it had been Thundercracker's renewed relationship with his procreators that had twisted his processor, maybe it had been the Air Commander, a commonsparked Vosian that had  risen from the gutters to be Megatron's second in command,  well  before the Rainmakers had ever joined with Megatron's army. It  had  not matter which it had been, all that really matter was that Thundercracker and Skywarp all but abandoned Hound to the harem when the servus-frame was only halfway through his carrying. Their visits had been few, focused only on  a quick interface, and then Hound had been abandoned again . 

 

That was when the originator to be had begun to plan his escape. There were no doors at the base of the Aerie. Most of Vos' buildings were specifically built to exclude groundpounders like Hound.  As much as he would have preferred to have escaped before emergence, the servus-frame's centre of gravity had shifted considerably once his creation's protoform had definitely to any considerable degree. He had been forced to wait, forced to feign joy and pleasure when his Seeker lovers had visited a final time, two full stellar-cycles before Silverbolt had emerged. It had been Pit, Pit to pretend to be happy,  and he had made a final attempt to reason with the mechs, only to be dismissed .  Thundercracker had been especially irritated to hear his liege, Megatron, and his progenitors questions, and Hound thought that maybe they had stayed away f rom Silverbolt's e mergence  to spite him. There absence had solidified the originator's conviction that he needed to escape the Aerie, escape Vos, and his newling had not even been a quartex  old before Hound had snuck onto a n energon transport,  departing for the borders of Vos ,  clutching Silverbolt to his chassis.

 

The questions that kept him from recharge were if Thundercracker and Skywarp were aware of his flight, if they were aware of his return to Iacon, if they would come for Silverbolt  at all . As Seekers they should automatically have been mad for their creation, but early scans had shone that the newspark took after the Seeker's originators, and rather than be a Seeker,  the ruling class of Vos , their first emerged would  be  a common aerial . Though they had not appeared displeased or concerned  at the time , they had become ambivalent towards Hound and his carrying  around  that same time. Seekerkin were excluded from the rule of Vos, destined to be housemech or labourers,  depending as whether or not they had contributive or receptive sparks . Perhaps his former lovers really did not care about Silverbolt,  due to his “inferior” frametype .

 

T hese worries continued in an infinite loop, and Hound lingered around the Autobot base late into the dark-cycle, instead of  returning to the hab suite Jazz had been kind enough to set up for him.  He  was turning the cozy suite into a home,  but living alone after so many stellar-cycles made him feel vulnerable. Silverbolt was happy to recharge anywhere,  his favourite place was magnetized to Hound's chassis, where he was recharging right now. It  hardly mattered to the newling if his originator sat online  through the dark-cycle at home or at the base. Truly, what  H ound needed was company, but it  was too late to o find much  of it in the common room, and truth be told, most  of the company Hound  might have hope d to find there  would be strangers. Most of the mechanisms he had b ecome  closest to after enlisting in the army  had been assassinated in the fallout of Punch's murder, and Soundwave's infiltration. Emerged to be an operative, the servus-frame had naturally preferred the company of  the Autobot operatives, and the y were few around now.  Those remaining were on operations throughout Cybertron,  not luxuriating in Iacon . Bumblebee  was the only experienced operative in the whole capital , the poor mech was  still recovering from his injuries, and  in any case, he was not short on company. Minibots seemed to  come together when one of their framekin were injured or ill, and Gears, Windcharger, Brawn and even Cliffjumper could all be counted on to be  near Bumblebee's sickberth  no matter the joor.

 

Maybe it was Mirage that Hound was missing. Seeing the minibots taking care of their kin reminded the servus-frame of his and his heres-frames relationship, prior to Hound's defection. True, it should always have been the servus taking care of the heres but on those occasions when Hound had been hurt, Mirage had been right there, taking care of him.  When the servus-frame had been upset, the heres-frame had been there comforting him.  Certainly the reverse had been true, but that had seemed like a given. But it had not been to Mirage.  They may have been paired as master and servant but they had always been brothers,  and the Towers mech ha d been the one to se e to that.

 

That was what he was missing. It may have been  many  vorns since Hound had defected to the Autobots, and he had largely gotten used  Mirage's absence in his mega-cycle to mega-cycle life, but  at this moment  Hound was feeling  a bit bereft.  Fond memories of the mega-cycles where the heres-frame guarded his back made him pine , but the Towers mech was not going to defect, not any time soon, and Hound had not even considered bringing it up  when Mirage had rushed to retrieve him and Silverbolt . All in all, it came down to loyalty, and Mirage's was torn  messily  between that to his progenitor, and that to his “brother”.  In all likelihood, his friend would remain in the service of the Crystal City until either Arcee died or the femme got him killed.

 

Jazz might have been able to help, at least so far as company went, even so far as Mirage went, but he was off on that op, and it was mostly just the originator and the rookie holding down the fort. Smokescreen was decent company. He was gregarious, animated, and quick-witted. Hound could see the same potential that Jazz saw in the Praxian. The mechling was cunning, and imaginative, and the trouble he had gotten in and out of over the vorns had turned him into a natural operative.

 

“Hi Hound,” that very mechling whispered his greeting as Hound entered Jazz's office. His optics were on Silverbolt, and the volume of his voice was low for the newling's sake. He really was a decent young mech. “I didn't expect anyone else to come around.”

 

“Good dark-cycle, Smokescreen,” Hound said. “I wasn't quite ready to recharge so I thought I would look over the Bumblebee's intel. Why aren't you in your berth?”

 

“Can't turn my processor off,” Smokescreen replied, with a great shrug of his doorwings. “Figured I'd bore it into recharge going over the camera footage.”

 

“What's bothering you?” The originator asked. Out of habit, Smokescreen had taken the seat that would normal face Jazz. Given the Polihexian was absent, Hound borrowed his chair.

 

“I have this feeling that something is up,” the Praxian explained. “Just can't shake it.”

 

“With the op?” Hound asked, genuinely concerned. 

 

“I don't know,” Smokescreen replied. “Just something... Maybe.”

 

“Why don't you tell me about it,” The servus-frame suggested. With the way the young mech's whole frame sagged, Hound thought there must have been a lot weighing on him.

 

“My progenitor got out of detention just before my originator came to Iacon,” the rookie explained. “He's... he's a sack of slag, and he's trying to stop my originator from bringing my brother over.”

 

“Are you worried he'll botnapped your brother?” Hound asked, feeling alarmed for the Praxian youngling, separated by his originator. It must have been difficult for the Praefectus Vigilum to go on this operation with this hanging over his helm.

 

“Yah,” Smokescreen admitted. “But I'm just worried in general. My progenitor was exiled so he could be anywhere on Cybertron. I just want to know where he is so I know if my family's safe.”

 

“Why don't we get something to fuel with, and you can tell me more?” The originator suggested. “Maybe between us we can track him down.”

 

***

 

Jazz woke as the berth shifted under him. His alarm was set to go off in a couple of kliks so he dismissed them preemptively. Given what had happened the dark-cycle before, the Polihexian made sure to make a little noise before he sat up and stretched. His cheek ached, and the early light coming from the berthroom's floor to ceiling windows felt too bright to his bare optics, and Jazz duck through his subspace to find his spare optical-band style visor. Being down to the last of this type of visor did not disturb him over much, one thing was certain, Folgare was being retired and he was NEVER coming back. Sometime down the line the Maestro was going to have an unfortunate, and public accident with a smelting pit.

 

“I'm gonna take care of my cheek 'n then you can “find” that bug,” Jazz explained. Feeling undercharge he stood up from the berth. After Prowl's memory purge, neither of them had had enough joors recharge, but they could not risk linger in the hotel hab suite for much longer.

 

“Allow me to assist you,” Prowl said, taking his own medkit from his subspace. 

 

“Oh, sure,” the Polihexian replied. He sat back on the berth, drawing his legs up and sitting in the middle of the recharge surface as his teammate selected the appropriate tool. “Thanks”

 

“I am the one who damaged you,” the tactician said, and he lifted the plating regenerator up to Jazz's cheekplate. “Do not move.”

 

P rowl's equilibrium had returned with recharge, something Jazz was both relieved and perturbed by. Admittedly, they could not afford for the Praxian to fritz out on the op, but at the same time, burying so much trauma under those tactical systems could not be healthy in the long or the short run. Not that he had not been burying them for vorns, so perhaps Jazz's concerns were  unwarranted . Whatever the case, he obeyed the other mech and sat perfectly still, his expression  neutral as the tactician ran the regenerator slowly up his cracked cheek. 

 

It was never an altogether pleasant process, microscopically  b ent plating was raised, and superheated in one go to melt the damaged proto-metal back together , and the n  cool ed . That said, it was no t so painful as to require a painblocker, not for a  crack  this small. Prowl was done in  a few kliks, and when Jazz raised his servo to his newly repaired faceplate, he found the repair to be perfectly smooth. Any subtle imperfections could now be resolved by his self-repair systems. All in all, it was not a bad job done.

 

“Let's get a couple of cubes,” Jazz suggested, once again climbing off the berth. “The bugs under the table in front of the lounge, just kneel and you outta see it.”

 

“Understood,” Prowl replied. Perhaps not all of the Praxian's equilibrium had returned. Those walls were up in his optics, making his expression hard and flinty, instead of expressionless calm. It was probably a little cruel of the saboteur to be grateful for this, but he preferred to see Prowl acting like a normal enough mech. He was probably embarrassed, and that was fair enough.

 

The tactician left the berthroom first, crossing the great room to the kitchenette and fetching two cubes of energon. Jazz played his part as libertine musician, and lowered himself onto the lounge  with a self-satisfied hum Truthfully, he was anything but relaxed, knowing that the bug was just centimetres away from his knee. He watched Prowl fill the cubes, and return to the great room. When the Praxian was close enough, Jazz  inclined  his helm to the corner of the table where the bug was hidden. A subtle nod from Prowl told the saboteur that his partner had understood.

 

“Thank you, lover,” he spoke in Folgare's voice.

 

“It is my pleasure, always,” Prowl replied. Speaking softly, as he had the entire time he had spoken as Pantera, the Praxian's voice seemed a little kinder. He handed Jazz the cube, and moved as though to sit himself. Instead he paused mid-motion, and then placed his cube on the table. Without speaking, he knelt on the floor, and plucked the bug from it's hiding place. “Folgare, look what I have found.”

 

“Is that a bug?” Folgare asked, feigning shock. 

 

“It is, how could I have missed it?” The Praxian exclaimed, playing the security expert perfectly. “I checked the room twice after we arrived it.”

 

“Maybe some housekeeper planted it in the last few cycles,” the musician suggested.

 

“I should have seen it,” Pantera replied. With a nod from Jazz, he crushed the device. Both mech relaxed, even Prowl visibly, with a light sag of his doorwings.

 

“Let's get our slag together and get the frag out of here,” Jazz said, standing quickly. “'M gonna get my bug back. Don't want anyone searching the room, 'n findin' anything funny.”

 

“I will collect our supplies,” Prowl replied, turning for the washracks. 

 

They were ready to go within a bream, Jazz stalled their departure just long enough to ensure Prowl drank his cube. After a final sweep of their suite, they headed to the elevator. The hallway was clear but both mech were keenly aware that danger could be waiting around the next corner. Thankfully, no mechanism crossed their path and they made it onto the elevator without any mishaps.  Jazz felt reasonably more secure once they stepped off the elevator, into the lobby. Folgare was too well known a figure to just be jumped in the middle of a public space, but  the saboteur  was not going to vent with relief until they were out of the hotel, and out of these paint jobs. Keeping a grave expression, Jazz,  or rather Folgare crossed the lobby to the reception desk at a quick pace. From the expression on his faceplates, the clerk  clearly  knew there was trouble.

 

“How can I help you, Maestro?” The pretty orange femme asked. 

 

“We'll be checking out,” he said, with steely politeness. He reached her servo out to Prowl who dropped the remains of the bug into his servo. “My companion found this in our room. You must understand that I value my privacy above _all_ else. Now I'm not _blaming_ you, but either one of your employees put this in my room for one of those... rags, or someone broke in. Either way, I cannot hope to feel comfortable in this hotel any longer.”

 

“I am so sorry, Maestro!” The clerk exclaimed. “Please, let me grab the manager, I'm sure we can do something to make up for this... Invasion.”

 

“All I want to do is check out,” Folgare replied, his voice took a higher note, exasperation flared in his field. 

 

There was no avoiding the manager, who in turn called the femme in charge of security. They both promised that the security tapes would be reviewed, but of course Maestro Folgare was firm, he would not be staying in the hotel a mega-cycle longer. Finally, the manager himself check them out, comping the pair for a good portion of their stay. Jazz would not complain about that bit, the bill for this Empirium was coming out of his department's budget. While Prowl, as Pantera, sulked behind him, saboteur played the gracious but irritated Folgare to the glyph.

 

“Again, I apologize,” the manager said.

 

“Thank you,” the musician replied. “It really did ruin an otherwise relaxing stay. Don't worry yourselves at all, you handled this so kindly, I will sing your praises to my friends.”

 

The manager brightened at that last bit, and Folgare and Pantera were gone from the hotel the next klik. They drove for a few bream,  making certain that they had lost the paparazzi tail that took off after them once they left the hotel before driving into a secluded space to change their paint, or in Jazz's case his  w hole alt-mode and armour configuration. Much like having his cheek repaired, the process of resetting his plating to its normal design was not especially pleasant , and his first transformation from car to mech, and reversed would not be pleasant at all. 

 

Jazz did not elect to look precisely like himself, rather he went back to that first disguise he had taken, stowing his visor for the time being. For a few joors, the light would seem unduly harsh to his optics, but they would amalgamate before too long. Once the spinning of his processor stopped, it always threw him through a loop to shift from Folgare or to Folgare from any other specs, Jazz turned to get a look a Prowl. The Praxian was all over shades of grey, ranging from slate to ash. With his rich finish having yet been stripped, the dull combination looked considerably more striking than it ought to have, and the saboteur almost missed the significance of the shades. It was reminiscent of the scheme assigned to all Diffusion novices. But it was only reminiscent, though the Fellowship as a whole practiced Metallikato, they were all trained in the history of the martial arts, and how to identify the discipline practiced by an opponent. To Jazz's trained optics, it was clear that the shades were all correct, but their order was wrong. 

 

Now what did this mean?

 

E nd Chapter 16.

 

 


	17. Chapter 17

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I'm baaaaack.

While colour nanites were easily changed, finishes had to be stripped, a process that was not necessarily time consuming, but still took some time. Though time was not something they had much of, Jazz knew it had to be spent. Their current finishes were too striking, no matter the blandness of their paint jobs. Thankfully there were self-detailing stations all Rodion, and it was only a matter of chooses the right one. Jazz displayed a map of Rodion in his HUD, and brought all the nearby detailing stations up on the map. There plenty nearby, one almost right around the corner, but this corner of the city-state was bustling with life, even at this early joor, and the saboteur did not want to risk any curious optics. 

To the southeast, along main artery out of Rodion, and towards the Crystal City, stood several convoy rest stops, and at least half of them had self-detailing stations. Convoys carried transports all over Cybertron, and drove at all joors of dark and light-cycle. There was an almost unspoken rule amongst the Convoys, that was those coming in late congregated at one rest stop, those leaving early another. It saved the long haul transport carriers from being woken from already too short recharge cycles. Quickly hacking into the Enforcer surveillance grid, Jazz narrowed his choice of stations down to two. Depending on which one still had most of its occupants in recharge upon their arrival, that would be the one he and Prowl would use. They had no time to waste. It was unclear if their cover had been blown, or only dented, but time was running out to save Scrounge and Tread Bolt, and Rodion itself.

“A self-detailin’ station is our best bet,” Jazz declared. “Thinkin’ a rest stop, ‘bout half a joor from here is the ticket. Convoys are stilling ‘chargin’. We can get in ‘n out before they wake up ‘n take notice.”

“A sound plan,” Prowl replied. Heavy praise from that mech. The Polihexian gave the Praxian a grin, earning him a little glint in the other mech’s optics. In Prowl-ese that was probably equivalent to a raised brow ridge.

He was still worried about Prowl. The distraction was not welcome, not in the middle of such a delicate op. What were the odds that Barricade would be in Rodion on a Decepticon op? Then again, what were the odds that Prowl would have made such an imaginative leap? Jazz frowned inwardly as they drove. His last communicube to Swindle had gone unanswered, and given his lousy intel at the beginning of this mess, the saboteur had his suspicions that the double dealer was double dealing him. Then again, that was Swindle’s modus operandi, and something that Jazz had long accepted as unavoidable when dealing with a criminal. It had been acceptable for stellar-cycles, but only because the scam artist had been a Neutral.

If the schemer had decided to cozy up to the Decepticons, that was something else entirely, and therein lay the problem; Jazz could not even begin to take the steps to confirm this suspicion until he was done with this op. It was grating on the saboteur’s last sensor that his servos were tied. Special Operations was all about information, and he felt like he was driving blind pretty much constantly. Smokescreen was not his only new recruit, but it took so fragging long to get a recruit trained to where you could safely call them an op, and it was time the Autobots did not have. What this meant was Jazz could not possibly expect to find the time to track that slagger Barricade down, provided he was not one of the ‘Cons active in Rodion. Something he felt particularly driven to do. Then again, everyone needed a side project, and if Mirage was getting bored wherever the frag he was lurking right now... Jazz vented a long breath. 

They needed to survive this op, needed to recover his mechs alive because Primus only knew he could not afford to lose two operatives in one go. He would have felt more comfortable about the odds if he had been with Hound, or Mirage, or even Bumblebee. The confidence he had held in Prowl had taken a hit. Jazz had faith enough in the Praxian’s tactical abilities, but he was no op. Prowl may have thought that he saw a shadow, but an experienced op did not take the chance, they could not afford to. It stemmed from self-doubt, from a lifetime living with the threat of reprogramming hanging over his helm. If it was not a tactical exercise, Prowl did not trust himself. This late in an op was a lousy time to discover your partner had confidence issues.

As Jazz had hoped, the Convoys making use of the rest stop he had chosen were still in recharge and the self-detailing station was unoccupied. Choosing the cheapest finish level possible, Jazz paid for two joors’ time, and directed Prowl to following him inside. The detailing space they had rented was large enough to fit a convoy, so it was more than big enough for the two of them. No interfacing signs stood out from the walls, and Jazz almost laughed. Prowl had to have seen them to, if that flick of a single doorwing was anything to go by.

“We can get this slag off quickest usin’ the auto-stripper,” Jazz said. “Will that be a problem for your doors?”

“Not so long as I am in vehicle mode,” Prowl replied.

“You first then,” the Polihexian ordered, while his partner transformed, Jazz looked over the controls. “Ready?”

“Yes.”

The mech did not use two glyphs where one could work, that was certain. Ready to shut the system down if Prowl vocalized any discomfort, Jazz activated the auto-stripper. The high power solvent spray made quick work of the once glossy finish. As was always the case, the finish came off much faster than it had taken to apply. Prowl transformed the instant the auto-stripper was disengaged, and the two mech traded places. Just as the tactician had, Jazz transformed into his vehicle mode, and braced for the spray to hit him. 

The force of the stripping spray was enough to sting a bit, though not really that unpleasant. The speed was worth the temporary discomfort. A side benefit to the forceful spray, it took off colour nanites here and there, adding to the downtrodden look Jazz wanted for them. Prowl would almost be a shadow, and for infiltration purposes, there could be no better look, especially for a rookie. The red accent on Jazz’s chassis did not worry the expert saboteur and infiltrator, it was hardly an uncommon colour in Rodion, and once he scuffed it up some, he would look like any other gutter-mech. 

“Novice colours but you got them reversed, why?” Jazz asked, after he had taken his root mode and joined Prowl by the finish dispenser. 

“I was never officially a novice,” Prowl replied. The even look he gave the Polihexian made the other mech guess that his observation, and thus his question had come as a surprise. “The Master trained me at the Institute and finally at the Ordo compound. I was never a member of his school.”

“Because of your glitch,” the saboteur sighed.

“Because of my glitch,” the Praxian confirmed. “On the final day we met he declared me a Master. He expressed that no previous student had accomplished what I had at so young an age, and that my accomplishment was that much more remarkable due to my affliction.”

“How much did you hate hearin’ that?” Jazz asked, helm cocked at the other mech.

“I have grown accustom to having my accomplishments weighed alongside my glitch,” Prowl said, pausing a nanoklik before making this confession: “It has never pleased me.”

“Woulda slagged me off,” the Polihexian agreed. “Turn around ‘n I’ll get your doors done while you get your front. Then you can help me.”

“That is amenable,” the tactician agreed. The solvent had done it’s job fairly well. Jazz only needed to apply more by cloth in a few corners of Prowl’s plating. It had taken bites out of the Praxian’s paint as well, and as the saboteur applied the dull finish, Prowl became forgettable. At the right angle, against the right wall or alley, most that saw him from the corner of their optics would not even notice the doorwings. 

“Think you’ll do,” Jazz declared when he gave his partner a careful look. “Alright, my turn. Let’s get this done so we can get to the Dockyards while it’s still quiet.”

***

Sitting on the sidelines was a foreign concept to Hound. He had been an active operative, usually on operations, for the majority of his life. First they had been with Mirage, after that they had been with the Autobots. Even before Soundwave’s infiltration there had not been so many skilled operatives amongst the Autobots, and Hound had been on operations alongside Jazz just as soon as he had proven to Punch that he would not get either of them killed. 

The long operation in Vos, that had turned into something altogether different, had not felt like down time. Despite the fact that he had been blindly in love with Thundercracker and Skywarp, Hound had still been working for the Autobots, in his own way. He had failed there, spectacularly. They had not aligned themselves with the Autobots, and the originator’s kindling seemed to have been the impetus to their indoctrination with the Decepticons, though Hound was still not clear as to how. After that the Autobot scout had been focused on a desperate mission to convince the Seekers of their errors, before finally accepting defeat, and escaping with his newling. 

Now that Hound and Silverbolt were safe in Iacon, and the anxiety and desperation had bled off, the scout had all too much time to think, and to worry. Bumblebee’s repairs were integrating well, if something went wrong with Jazz’s operation, he would be able enough to hold down the department if an extraction was necessary, if Mirage could not help. Hound stroked his creation’s small helm. Mirage counted Jazz as a friend, and he would help, provided Arcee did not get in his way. The femme, for all Hound had known her his entire function, was too much of a wildcard to be discounted.

What would the scout do if Mirage got into trouble? Would he even know? Would Mirage call him, call Jazz for help or would he rely on his fickle progenitor? Hound hated all the questions, and all of the doubts, and he hated having the time he had to dwell on them. After leaving Smokescreen the previous dark-cycle, the originator had only managed a fitful recharge, he doubted the young mech had much of a better. The Praxian was do to join him in Jazz office, aka Ops Central, after his mid-cycle classes at the Academy. For the next several joors, Hound was on his own.

He had hardly settled in to begin the mega-cycle’s work when Rewind arrived. The small mech looked overly chipper, likely to disguise his feelings regarding the rumours circulate the base. It could not be pleasant to have your Conjunx Endura’s designation dragged through the rust, whether or not it may have been deserved. Difficult as well to know that your Conjunx Endura’s former partner had TWO creations, when neither you nor your partner had been able to bud with even one. Rewind was not the most confident mech, Hound could sympathize, and might sympathize more if every mention of Prowl’s designation in the minibot’s present did not stir up vocalized disdain. Considering Prowl and Rewind had never met, it felt strikingly unfair.

“A couple of communicubes came in, level thirteen lock and encryption,” the minibot explained as he handed the cubes over. He glanced at Silverbolt, an unreadable expression on his faceplates. “Do you need anything for him?”

“I have everything I need, thank you Rewind,” Hound replied. “I appreciate the offer.”

“Sure thing Hound, uh, welcome back,” Rewind said. He was gone in nanokliks. The servus-frame vented a sigh, and he hoped Rewind worked through his emotions before he became too jaded.

The encryption on the first communicube was more of a puzzle than a password. Hound was one of the few that knew the pattern, and he had the cube online and playing a pre-recorded message. Jazz was not displayed on the five screens. On the off chance that the recording was intercepted, the saboteur was shadowed. This contacted, pre-recorded or not put some of Hound’s anxieties at ease. Relaxing into his, or rather Jazz’s chair, he listened to the distorted voice that played back to him.

“Gonna makes this quick, I got work for you, Canguro. Pantera may or may not have seen one Barricade. I need you to track him. See if you can’t figure out where he went after he got exiled from Praxus, if he’s a ‘Con, I wanna know. Cover mighta been blown, or at least dented so we’ve gone to ground. The lord’s in on it, reprogramming for sure, don’t let the Prime come here. It’s in their optics, Canguro, you can tell. What a fraggin’ mess this is. Lookin’ for our mechs, narrowed down the search area. Coordinates at the end of this message, use the code you taught me to make sense of it.”

Hound memorized the garbled coordinates, and metaphorically set them aside to translate later. Reprogramming. It was a hideous thought, and brought up memorizes of Senate scandals, and the fall of the Golden age. No, it really was not a surprise that Megatron would repeat, and “improve upon” the atrocities of his enemies in the Grand Imperium. Would the miner called Megatronus on seeing his future self’s deeds recoil in horror at how far he had fallen from a righteous path? Or would he think the ends justified the means?

Like the first cube, the second had a pattern encryption, and Hound wasted no time in unlocking it. He realized the nanoklik that it activated that this was not a recording. He waited, watching the activated but silent communicube with growing dread. Few mechanisms had long range comms, which eliminated the need for long range communicubes, except for sending a recorded message, as Jazz had. Finally, a familiar face flickered on the cube, catching Hound completely by surprise.

“Hound! Oh thank Primus!” Scrounge appeared on the cube, frantic red optics so bright the smooth mental of his pyramid shaped helm all but glowed. “The Decepticons, they got us, they still have Treadbolt... They’ve done something to him... I don’t know, he’s violent, he’s killed some of them but... I escaped, my comms are shorted, it’s taken me mega-cycles just to fix this cube... It’s going to short again, I know it! Please tell me there’s evac on the way!”

“We have ops on the ground,” Hound said, reassuring the operative, but revealing as little as possible. His training told him to be cautious, even with an Autobot operative. “Give me your coordinates as I’ll pass them along. We’ll get you out. Do you know where the Decepticons are hiding?”

“Thank you!” The minibot operative exclaimed. Just as Scrounge had given Hound both sets of coordinates, the communicube flicker, the scout saw the minibot’s servo reach out to shake it. “It’s shorting out again. Please, tell Jazz to hurry!”

The communicube went dead, and for a klik, Hound just stared at it. After collecting himself, he took the jumbled coordinates Jazz had given him. They left him frowning. Scrounge’s personal coordinates were close to where Jazz suspected the Decepticons were hiding out. Meanwhile the coordinates where he said the Decepticons were were on the opposite side of the city from where Jazz thought they were hiding. Hound frowned, and contemplated the disparity. His processor turned back to the Polihexian’s communicube message.

“It’s in their optics...”

An image of Scrounge face projected on the servus-frame’s HUD. Hound had thought the expression frantic, but Jazz’s glyphs had him second guessing. Without conventional faceplates, an olfactory ridge, mouthplatesm even conventional optics, Scrounge emoted 100% through his optics, and they tended to brighten, darken, and flash as he spoke, but they had not changed at all during something his frantic speech. No, the entire time Scrounge had been speaking, his optics had been blindingly bright. 

Hound frowned further. He had not said Jazz was the op on the ground, though he supposed the minibot could have guessed it, it felt like too far a reach. The servus-frame fell back in his chair, and internally glared at the map on his HUD. Scrounge was almost certainly no longer an Autobot operative, now he was a Decepticon mole, laying out a trap for Jazz and Prowl. Worse than all that, he knew Jazz was in Rodion. The rescue team’s cover had not just been blown, it had been vaporized. 

***

“Go Hound,” Jazz said as he initiated his long range comms. It was never ideal to talk, and drive at the same time, but an old servo at this, the Polihexian kept his visual sensors on the road. The road, of course, and not Prowl’s outmoded but still rather attractive bumper.

“Scrounge made contact,” the servus-frame revealed, his grim voice made Jazz picture a frown on the typically light-sparked mech’s faceplates. “He gave me coordinates for him and the ‘Cons, they don’t jive with yours.”

“We could be wrong...” The saboteur began, he was quickly interrupted.

“I don’t think so,” Hound explained. “His coordinates are close to where you think the ‘Cons are. The optics are the clue, right? His optics might as well have been glowing. You know how he is, Jazz. He talks with his optics.”

“Sounds like he’s been reprogrammed,” Jazz said. “I was afraid of that.”

“He said something about Tread Bolt being violent, killing ‘Cons, something may have gone wrong with Tread’s reprogramming,” the scout added. “I didn’t tell him you were on the ground Jazz... He could have guessed, but he asked me to tell you to hurry, by designation.”

“We’ll operate as if our cover’s blown,” the Polihexian replied. “We need transport ready at a nanokliks notice, and evac on standby.”

“That’ll be my next comm, be careful,” Hound said.

Though the confirmation that his mechs were in Decepticon servos was not surprising, it was certainly the worst news Jazz could have received. Whatever Tread Bolt’s condition, if he was actually still alive, Scrounge was actively trying to trap the saboteur, which made the risks of catching him, and returning him Iacon for treatment that much riskier. The likelihood that the minibot retained enough of his knowledge of the Autobots, and his training to conclude that Jazz was in Rodion was the most worrying thing. Either his operative had failed to follow protocols, and had not wiped his processor upon capture, or they had incapacitated quickly enough that Scrounge had never had the chance. There was no telling what secrets the capture operative had revealed after his reprogramming, and Jazz could not help but curse the mech under his ventilations. Autobot Special Ops could not survive another infiltration, and Jazz was going to have to race against the chronometer to clean up this mess, and shore up the security around his ops Cybertron wide.

Wanting Prowl’s opinion about the situation, and the use of his ATS, Jazz turned off the highway, and in the first lot he saw. The Praxian pulled in beside him. Before he could ask any question, Jazz sent Prowl a transcript of his conversation with Hound. Apart from a ping signalling the tactician had received the data, the tactician made no response. Jazz rested on his wheels, and waited. As he waited, he brought up the data-net, and scanned for any news on the party. Via several tabloid rags, the Polihexian found a few pictures of he and Prowl (Pantera) leaving the hotel, but they were buried under dozens of photos of Enforcers blocking the entrance of the Empirium.

“No Enforcer has been willing to answer our questions but a source inside the Empirium says that the Enforcers are at this hotel to speak to the Maestro Folgare. The Maestro, as you may already know, checked out early this light-cycle, before the Enforcers arrived. Our source says the Maestro was upset to fight an audio bug in his hab suite, and checked out in a huff.” 

“No glyph yet if the Enforcers were responsible for the bug in Folgare’s hotel suite. All requests for comment from Enforcers goes unanswered, and Folgare has not been seen since he left the hotel.”

Jazz went over tabloid after tabloid to see if he could identify any of the Enforcer. They had arrived three joors after the Autobots had checked out, and most of the paparazzi had gone looking for the next story. None of the empty Enforcer faces were familiar to Jazz. Using the same hack that he had utilized early in the mega-cycle, the saboteur accessed the surveillance grid, and found the Enforcers were still waiting outside the Empirium, but not just at the front entrance. He switched back to the data-net feed, catching the news anchor just as she began to speak.

“A breaking news report from Rodion. The Rodion Enforcers have issued an all points bulletin for the Maestro Folgare, and his companion, a Praxian by the designation Pantera. They are wanted for questioning regarding a fire at an event hosted by the Lord of Rodion. The Maestro checked out of the Empirium early in the light-cycle. There have been no sightings of the Polihexian folk musician since.” 

There would not be anymore sightings of Folgare, not until Jazz got around to putting him out of his metaphorical misery. Still, it was troublesome that their frametypes had been named. They would have to be careful, exceedingly careful, and remain in their vehicle modes as much as possible. Jazz passed this new information on to Prowl, and went back to waiting. The news stations repeated the same reports and the same pictures. Someone had directed the Enforcers to the hotel, someone unlikely to have been reprogrammed, but whomever it was had avoided having his or her picture captured. It bothered the saboteur, he needed a face on his nemesis, but it would take too much time, and too much risk to hack the security archives. Camera feeds themselves were easy, and relatively safe to hack, most incursions went undetected, as Jazz believed his had, but only the most careful hack could hope to breach an archive without detection, and the Polihexian did not have the time for such an operation.

“I calculate a 97.6% chance that your theory is correct, and Scrounge is leading us into a trap,” Prowl said, after a bream. “Regardless, we need to make contact.”

“I wanna go in first,” Jazz replied. “The only Praxian he knows of in Ops is Smokey, and he knows your mechlin’ is a rookie.”

“You suggest I observe from a safe distance?” The tactician asked.

“Exactly,” the Polihexian confirmed. “I know more of his moves than he knows of mine. I keep my comms open, you watch my back.”

“The odds are not favourable, but none are at this point,” Prowl said. “Do you have the necessary equipment to level an apartment complex?”

“To take out the ‘Cons base, ya I got what I need,” Jazz confirmed, his tone grim. “You’re thinkin’ we might need to cut our losses.”

“I believe we must do what we can to retrieve Scrounge and Tread Bolt,” the Praxian replied. “However the Decepticons cannot be allowed to continue reprogramming the population of Rodion.”

“Do you think I should give up on my mechs?” The saboteur asked, in the same grim tone.

“No,” Prowl said. “An attempt must be made to retrieve them.”

“Because they are a liability?” Jazz asked. He did not want to judge Prowl as cold, or calculating, but the mech was a tactician, a particularly good one, and did that leave him any room to care about two mechs?

“In part,” the tactician replied. “But also because there is still a possibility of reversing the reprogramming, and returning them to their selves. That is our assignment.”

“Thanks Prowler,” the Polihexian said, cheering a little. He could make a the difficult decision to blow the ‘Cons base, with his mechs inside or not. However it had to be the last option. At least for now, Prowl appeared willing to go along with that. “Alright, time to see if Scrounge is still waiting for us.”

***

 

It had taken only one arrest at the demonstration in the docks to throw Rodion into chaos. Every protest appeared to have received news of the arrests simultaneously, a sure sign that the demonstrations had been organized by the same group of mechanisms. As the news had spread throughout the crowds of angry mechanisms, they had surged against the Enforcers blocking access to government offices, and businesses, before quickly overwhelming dozens of the ill equipped units. Now, they were sacking, and burning whatever they could access Rodion wide. The militia, almost certainly reprogrammed or replaced with Decepticons, had been activated to guard the Heights and the government officials that lived in the luxury habsuites inside. The remainder of central Rodion had been left to burn.

Doubt flitted through Prowl’s processor, supported rather than disputed or suppressed by his ATS. The odds of successfully rescuing the reprogrammed Autobots were becoming increasingly poor. A rescue operation of mechs ready to assist in their own rescue would have been complicated enough in the chaotic violence raging just blocks away. Given the added complication that both Autobots had almost certainly been reprogrammed led the tactician to believe that the operatives were all but doomed. As brilliant a strategist as Prowl was, he could not in fact perform miracles. He desperately needed something to work with, but no matter the angle he took, all the strategist’s tactical systems produced was doom.

They remained crouched low against the wall of a derelict Eastside tenement. Though they were mere blocks away from the Dockyards, the distance seemed insurmountable. Prowl’s optics were caste down, staring at nothing, as his tactical systems worked. Jazz’s servo, a grounding presence on the centre of his back, kept Prowl linked to the chaos outside his processor. It was only with this contact that the Praxian was able to justify allowing himself to be acutely vulnerable as he lost all real awareness of the danger just metres away.

Their destination was a half finished shopping centre who’s construction had been abandoned at least a century before. Why the construction had stopped was not terribly significant. Though the implication that the Decepticons could have been working, unnoticed in Rodion for one hundred stellar-cycles was unnerving. Prowl ignored that thought process, throwing his all into the real problem at servo. The disturbance was largely centred at the actual docks, and the mall’s location, a few breams’ drive away, and the lack of anything worth looting remaining, had thus far left it unmolested. 

Prowl was certain they could get to the meeting place. The Enforcers stationed at the Dockyards borders were stretched too thin to be a real hindrance. It was what to do then, and what to do after that kept the tactician’s logic computer freezing up. If they captured Scrounge, how were they meant to transport him? Was capturing Scrounge ideal? Would it not be preferable to trick the reprogrammed operative into leading them to the Decepticon base? Certainly the later idea was out of the question. With the instability of the Dockyards taken into consideration, it was far too risky to play tear’n’chase with Decepticons. 

The only logical move was to abandon the mission. Prowl felt a pinch in his helm as he settled on this conclusion. It was only logical to declare Rodion rogue; they had more than enough evidence to dissuade the Prime from travelling to the city-state. Jazz would never consent, however. He might consent to Prowl returning to Iacon, but he would never abandon his subordinates to their twisted fade, and for all it was the logical tactic, the tactician could not bring his glossa to even speak it. Leaving the mechs to remain reprogrammed was simply too hideous an idea to consider. 

Three digits tapped on his back, and pulled Prowl from the thought loop his ATS had become trapped in. The servo the digits were attached to slipped from his back to his helm. Only then did the strategist realize that his processor had become overheated. It was not enough to concern Prowl, but Jazz could hardly be expected to know different. Prowl fought the impulse to clench his jaw. He was not at risk of crashing, and he felt a brief surge of anger, and exasperation.

“I am not going to crash,” Prowl declared in a whisper. “My processor runs hot when my ATS is operating at peak power.”

“Ain’t about to risk it,” Jazz replied, his lipplates drawn in a taunt line. “Seemed like you were goin’ through a loop.”

“I am confident I can lead us to Scrounge’s last reported location,” the tactician explained, neither affirming or denying the other’s observation. “However, I do not have the data to formulate a plan to move beyond that.”

“That’s enough for me,” the Polihexian said. Prowl could only stare at him. “’M not crazy, Prowl. If Scrounge is around to catch, we’ll catch’m. Then I’ll interrogate him, ‘n getcha the data you need to get us outta here alive, ‘n hopefully to Treadbolt.”

“Interrogations take time,” Prowl did not so much argue as he did reason with the saboteur.

“Not my methods, with my mechs,” Jazz countered. “I programmed his firewalls, I can bring’em down in a bream or less. Good firewalls take quartexes, even stellar-cycles to put up. Nothin’ the ‘Cons coulda rigged this fast will keep me out.”

It seems like madness to Prowl, but it was a compelling madness. He input this new information, and his ATS delivered a small beacon of hope. Though the likelihood of the successful retrieval of both Autobot agents remained low, the likelihood that Scrounge could be retrieved, and the Decepticon base identified had gone up considerably. 62.32% were not the odds the tactician preferred to operate with, but it was enough in this mess.

“In which case, we need to begin moving,” the Praxian declared as he climbed to his peds. It was absolutely madness, but fortune often seemed to favour the insane.

Having already selected the route with the best hope of success, Prowl sent Jazz a map of the Dockyards with the route highlighted. The saboteur nodded his acceptance of the route, and gestured for the Praxian to take the lead. It was likely an uneasy choice for the senior operative. These were his mechs, and he was the experienced operative. Prowl’s impression of the Polihexian continued to improve. He had the makings of an excellent commander. Many officers were not capable of taking directions from subordinates, even when those subordinates were better prepared to lead.

It would be reckless to use their vehicle-modes now, despite the increased speed those modes would allow them. Those modes were louder, and above all, it was difficult to hide in a vehicle-mode, with the exception of within a crowd, and the rioting crowds were the last place the Autobots needed to find themselves. Prowl paused as he spotted the first Enforcers guarding the roadway into the Dockyards. What he saw made his spark sick.

A dead mech lay in the middle of the road. Other mechanisms, still amongst the functional stood out of range of Enforcer blasters, screaming at the reprogrammed mechs. Reprogramming had not made the Enforcers fearless, not at all, and Prowl predicted more laser fire would fly in any moment. The Autobots could not allow themselves to be seen by either the enraged civilians or the twitchy Enforcers. Before the tactician could formulate a plan, Jazz caught his wrist. Prowl looked down to see the Polihexian extending a data-cable to him. Of course. Comms were too risky this close to the to an Enforcer operation. Prowl accepted the cable and inserted the tip into the side of his neck.

Unlike with comms, Jazz could not communicate with clear glyphs, so much as ideas, and images. Prowl understood his plan readily enough, even without glyphs. Jazz had a device, a smoke bomb of sorts, and he intended to throw it between the Enforcers, and the protesters. It seemed like a reasonable enough plan, save for the impression that the saboteur was not altogether certain the device would not just explode in their faces. The image of a masked mech with light-up fins on the sides of his helm superimposed itself. This was the device’s inventor. 

Before Prowl could make any protest, Jazz reclaimed his cable, and removed the device from his subspace. For three terrifying nanokliks, the Polihexian held down the trigger at the top of the bomb. When it did not explode in their faceplates, Jazz gave Prowl a wide grin, and then hurled it into the air. It flew overhead, whatever the saboteur’s other skills, his throwing arm was nothing to sneer at. For an instant it seems as though it was going to fall harmlessly to the ground, but then there was a startling blast and smoke immediately enveloped the street. The Autobots wasted no time, and raced diagonally down the street, and disappeared down the unguarded street to the right before the smoke cleared.

The shopping centre construction site appeared empty. Long robbed of any valuables, it held no attraction to looters. Much of the building was only the skeletal frame, but cheap metal plating covered a good portion of the lower levels. If Rodionians could purge themselves of the Decepticons, there was a chance that they would finish construction of this mall, in the process of rebuilding their city-state, but sharing a border with Decepticon held Polihex meant that Rodion’s future, whatever happened in now, was going to be a hard one. Rather than enter the site immediately, Jazz led Prowl along as he circled the skeletal building, optics again obscured by his visor. He looked, and he listened, as carefully as the tactician himself had been during his investigation at the habsuite. On the second loop, the Jazz stopped and held up a servo. In the next nanoklik he was cutting a panel off the side of the half finished building, next to the keypad of a sealed door. With the internals of the lock mechanism exposed, it took him very little time to get the door to open. The saboteur did not enter immediately. Rather, he cocked his helm and listened. Nodding to himself, Jazz turned to Prowl, and initiated their shared comm.

“Somemech’s pacin’ in there,” he explained. “Scrounge can’t stay still when he’s stressed... or in general, so it just might be him. Looks like they were building an atrium, the ceilin’ open to the sky. I need you to find a way up to the second floor, ‘n get a sight on our mech.”

 

“What do you intend to do?” Prowl asked. His Enforcer training had turned him into an adept sniper. To him, taking high ground meant finding the shot, and waiting.

“If I can, I wanna get a dampener on him, ‘n knock ‘m out long enough to get ‘m in stasis cuffs,” Jazz explained. “If he tries to take me out, you gotta take him out.”

“Understood.”

End Chapter 17.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologies for the long delay in getting this chapter out. RL is not muse friendly.


	18. Chapter 18

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am not all together happy with how this chapter turned out but I could fight with it forever and never be happy. So here it is. I hope that it isn't too stilted.
> 
> I've opened a Tumblr where I'm planning to talk about plots, and writing, and the evil that is an uncooperative muse. Anon-E-Miss, find me if you so wish.

Once again, Hound found himself sitting and waiting. There had been a time when he would have known precisely where Mirage was meant to be, and precisely when he was meant to return. If the scout himself had not been standing at his heres’ side, he would have been nearby, ready to retrieve the Towers mech should his mission go awry. No one was waiting in the shadows to come to Mirage’s aid now; he had never replaced Hound. Had Mirage done so, the scout would not have been able call his friend into this debacle. Guilty at this though, Hound signalled through their private comm.

 

Only a bream before Smokescreen was meant to arrive, the Towers spy signalled Hound back, alerting the servus-frame that old partner had activated his side of the comm. Unlike the obscure, but still more common long range comms, this relay only ran between the Hound and Mirage via specialized transceivers in their helms. It only functioned when both transceivers were active, hence need signal the other mech via other channels. The Autobot scout would have felt better seeing Mirage’s faceplates, so that he could have reassured himself that his friend was in good repair, but the Communication-Grid was anything but secure.

 

“You had me worried,” Hound said once the comm had connected. Frowning pensively, he stared at the wall. “Are you okay?”

 

“Yes, Hound, I’m fine,” Mirage replied. “Given the reports on Folgare, and the riots, I imagine Jazz has run into some trouble.”

 

“He’s moving in on his target,” the scout explained. “But the situation is probably worse than the media is able to report. If it goes to Pit, he’s going help fast. Are you in range?”

 

“I will be shortly,” the Towers mech answered, vaguely. “I’ll try and keep my comms open, but it won’t always be possible... I’ll respond when I can.”

 

“I understand,” Hound replied. “If you need help, Mirage you need to call me.”

 

“If there’s no other choice,” Mirage said. The scout supposed that this was as close to an agreement as they were going to get.

 

“Be safe,” the servus-frame pleaded. “And be in touch.”

 

Hound knew why Mirage had worked alone since he had defected to Iacon. They had grown, and trained together from the instant they could walk, and there was a trust between them that could not be forged easy, and it had only been forged at all because they had both been receptive to it. Mirage was in many ways an abnormal noblemech. The latent power imbalance between heres and servus had always perturbed him, and the politics of the Towers had generally left him frustrated. From the moment he could articulate his thoughts, Mirage had treated Hound as a friend and equal, even though their partnership had never been meant to be one of equals. Most of the servus-frames the Autobot scout had associated with over the course of his youngling and adulthood had been distrustful of Mirage’s intentions towards him, and his own procreators had warned the scout that an improper relationship with his heres would only lead Hound into trouble. None had understood that all Mirage had wanted was friendship, something the servus-frame had felt driven to return.

 

It would not suit Mirage to be matched with another noble spy. They had all trained too closely with Arcee, and were all loyal to the Spymaster. He would never accept one of his progenitor’s sycophants as his partner. This was the primary reason Mirage continued to operate on his own. The imbalance of power between servus and heres was too intolerable to Mirage for him to accept such a partner. Eventually Arcee had given up attempting to pair her creation up, though Mirage was always wary of her influence amongst his neighbours in the Towers. Any of his framekin could be amongst her stable of noble spies, and the Towers mech had long elected to keep his progenitor at arms reach, his personal life carefully guarded from her all seeing optics. As a result of all this, now that Hound was gone, Mirage lived a very isolated state. A life the servus-frame knew was not actually ideal for the spy. Unfortunately, it would take nothing less than a personal disaster to convince Mirage to not only change his loyalties, but his personal beliefs, and Hound feared that whatever the disaster might eventually be would have fatal consequences for his friend.

 

“Hey, Hound,” Smokescreen announced himself.

 

“Good mid-cycle, Smokescreen,” Hound said, and he offered the young Praxian a faint smile. At least the cycle’s training session would distract him from worries over Mirage.

 

“The whole city is up in arms about Rodion,” the rookie revealed as he took his seat. “Prime’s trips been cancelled, obviously. A little lilleth told me that he holed up in a secret meeting with the senate, trying get them to sign off on sending the Primal Vanguard into Rodion, despite Lord Legonis’ resistance. From what I’m hearing, they’ve dug their peds in.”

 

“They wouldn’t want to set the precedence,” the servus-frame replied with a world weary sigh. “Never mind if thousands of innocent lives are in danger. It doesn’t even matter that it all screams Decepticons.”

 

“I wish my originator was here,” Smokescreen sighed. “He would stalk into the senate, and twist their glyphs, and complaints until their glossas were too tripped up to disagree with him.”

 

“Have faith in Optimus,” Hound said. “He’s finding his peds when it comes to the Senate, but he isn’t a pushover. I take it your originator is a force to be reckoned with?”

 

“Origin is judicious with force,” the young Praxian explained, with a small frown. “It makes a bigger impact that way, I’ve learned. I’m sure he knows it too. I wish he was here because he’d do one quick read of the Autobot code, the constitution of Cybertron, and create an interpretation that basically said doing what he says is the only reasonable solution. Unreasonable mechanisms might try to resist, usually just for the Pit of it, and that’s when force comes in. Leaks to the press are a favourite when it comes to politicians. Or leaving all their sins and secrets open for all optics to see.

 

“That’s rather conniving,” the scout replied. “Jazz will be impressed.”

 

“I always hated it when he used it on me,” Smokescreen admitted. “But the reality is that he was usually right when it came to me. I just wasn’t a reasonable mech, and no penalty could make me change my processor. Sometimes I really wasn’t fair to him... And sometimes it seemed like he just didn’t care about what I might actually want or need. We’re just starting to talk again. The funny thing is I didn’t realize all the things I’d missed about him until I saw him here.”

 

“If you ever need another set of audial to vent to, I’m here,” Hound said. The idea that Prowl was flawed did not come as any surprise to the new originator, neither did it make him less admirable in the mech’s optics. It only saddened him that the Praxian family continued to struggle.

 

“Thanks, Hound,” the rookie replied. “I’m still not sure how much I _like_ him, but a lot of the anger and hurt I’ve carried through the stellar-cycles faded without me noticing it, and I don’t know what I would do if I lost him.”

 

“An adult relationship with your procreators is always a hard thing to figure out,” the new originator declared. “I think you’ll both do well...”

 

Hound train of thought was lost as there was a rap on the door. Knock... knock, knock... knock... knock. He canted his helm, his curiousity, and anxiety piqued. Whoever was waiting for entry knew the “password”, and so was either an operative or a contractor. Except the servus-frame was not expecting anyone, and while Jazz’s contractors could appear without warning, given the current climate Hound was not prepared to assume this visitor was friendly, simply because he or she knocked. An image of Scrounge’s blindingly bright optics came to the forefront of Hound’s processor. Before signalling the mech or femme to enter, the originator stood, and placed himself between the door and his recharging creation. Taking a cue from Hound, Smokescreen stood as well, stepping to towards the door and too the side, his doorwings angled forward a few degrees. The servus-frame felt a burst of pride in the rookie; he had the makings of an excellent operative.

 

“Dev?” Smokescreen gasped as the newcomer stepped into the doorway.

 

“Smokey?” The newcomer echoed the Praxian’s surprise, and took a single step back. For a nanoklik Hound thought this was trouble, but when his field brushed Smokescreen’s, he found it full of sparkling-like glee. When he reached his EMF out further he found the blue war-build had an only slightly more subdued emotional reaction in his field.

 

Dev, as Smokescreen had called the mech, recovered himself quickly, and before either Hound or Smokescreen needed to invite him to, he stepped into Jazz’s office. Mutely, he held a dataslug to the servus-frame, all the while staring at the Praxian. Hound check the slug, and found it to be the credentials of one of Jazz’s many contractors, an Autobot bounty hunter by the designation of Devcon. This mech was a stranger to Hound, which only made sense. According to the records attached to his credentials, Jazz had first contracted his services after the scout had gone to Vos.

 

“What are you doing here, Dev?” Smokescreen asked, incredulous. “And wearing the Autobot insignia!?”

 

“I should ask you the same,” Devcon replied, wearing an expression that looked like the perfect mix of confusion and pleasure. “Last I heard you were in the detention centre.”

 

“I got out early,” the Praxian explained. “Ended up here... What about you? I can’t believe Lockdown turned Autobot.”

 

“No,” the bounty hunter said, with a shake of his helm. “I went into business for myself. Jobs from Jazz are pretty much what keep me afloat.”

 

Hound smiled. It did not bother him in the least that the young mechanisms were ignoring him in favour of each other. At first sight, Devcon had not appeared all that young, but with his guard down, as he and Smokescreen chattered, it was clear to the servus-frame that the two mechanisms were about the same age. The designation Lockdown was familiar to Hound as well, though he did not let on. It was a simple matter to read between the lines. Lockdown was a notorious Decepticon bounty hunter, and while his designation was whispered with fear amongst Autobot outposts now, he had possessed a frightening reputation long before the Decepticons had become the to true force of terror they had become. At one point he had been known to have a young partner, rumoured to be his own creation. This must have been Devcon. Hound was comfortably certain that Smokescreen had not met this mech through his originator, rather Lockdown had likely been an associate of Barricade.

 

“Cool,” Smokescreen replied, he glanced at Hound and looked a little sheepish. “Hound, this is Devcon... But I guess you read that already... Umm...we go back... vorns. Devcon, this is Hound. He’s in charge right now.”

 

“Hello, Devcon,” Hound said, genially. He gave no hint of the musings of his processor. “I assume you’re looking for Jazz.”

 

 

“Yes, sir,” Devcon confirmed. “I have a bounty for him, dropped off with the Vanguard... I could get him for you.”

 

“Not necessary,” the scout replied. “The procedure hasn’t changed since I was based in Iacon. Who’s the bounty?”

 

“Boom, a two bit thug,” the bounty hunter explained. “He and his buddy Sonic are responsible for sabotaging the Autobot outpost in Uraya. Jazz said he wanted to have a little chat with the mech, or both of them if I can pick up Sonic.”

 

“He’ll have to stew until Jazz returns,” Hound said. He crossed his arms, and his lipplates shifted into a half smile. “A little time to imagine what might be coming should soften him up nicely, actually. I’ll transfer your payment onto your credit chip. Smokescreen, why don’t you take Devcon to the commissary. Consider yourself off duty for the dark-cycle.”

 

“Thanks Hound,” Smokescreen smile broadly, his doorwings flared wide as he turned to his old friend. “What do ya say Dev? Want to grab a cube?”

 

“That sounds great,” Devcon replied with a smile of his own.

 

The young mechs went on their way, becoming more and more animated as they began reacquainted. Hound settled back in his/Jazz’s chair. He reached a servo to stroke his slumbering creation’s faceplates. Jazz would not be concerned about a relationship between one of his contractors and one of his operatives. There was a good chance he would approve. Smokescreen’s originator may well have different feelings. Devcon was all but certainly a friend from the rookie’s seedy past, and Hound wondered if Prowl would be particularly open minded about Devcon’s reappearance. For sake of his future relationship with his creation, the new originator hoped Prowl was not too hard helmed, or whatever relationship Smokescreen and he were tentatively rebuilding would be shattered, and the fault would not lie with his creation.

 

***

 

“How did you end up here?” Devcon asked as he and Smokescreen settled at a small table in the middle of the mess hall.

 

“Jazz recruited me out of the Academy,” Smokescreen explained. “He somehow got wind of my side business, and decided I’d make a good op. I was tempted but I didn’t want to drop out, Jazz insisted I stay in school. So I train around my classes.”

 

“Still running a gambling racket?” The bounty hunter asked, with a chuckle. “Glad you’re sticking with the Academy. You were always too smart for the rest of us.”

 

“Not really,” the rookie op replied, shrugging his doorwings. Though he tried to school them, his doorwings shifted here and there on his back as he sat with Devcon. The noise of the room, the hustle and bustle of dozens of mechanisms, echoed off his doorwings. It should have been distracting but Smokescreen found it grounding instead. “Datapad wise, maybe but real life? No, I’m a bit of an idiot.”

 

Did he ever feel like an idiot, Smokescreen tried not to groan at his total lack of game. The last time he had seen Dev had never been meant to be the last time. Lockdown had taken his creation on a bounty. They had both been disappointed that junior bounty hunter was going to miss Smokescreen’s party, it had been meant to be their first public event as an item. Masking his disappointment, Smokescreen had suggested that they have a private celebration once Devcon had returned. But instead the Praxian had wound up in the detention centre, never seeing the Altihexian again until this mega-cycle.

 

“I never knew what happened at your party,” Devcon said, his hesitance obvious. Strangely, for the first time, the mention of that party did not send Smokescreen’s spark into a death spin. It had to have been Devcon. The mech’s presence had always made him feel more steady.

 

“Fangry and Rapidfire slipped my brother enough circuit speeders that his spark almost burnt out,” Smokescreen explained. “I turned around, saw him fritzing on the floor, and called medivac. It was my party so I got arrested. I pled guilty, mostly out of guilt. I didn’t have the spark to fight.”

 

“I’m sorry,” the Altihexian said. “I came back to town, and everyone was talking about how you’d snitched. I knew there had to be a reason.”

 

“I couldn’t comm you,” the Praxian revealed. “Not just because of the plea deal. I knew I had to leave that life, and I thought my resolve wouldn’t stick if I kept _any_ ties.”

 

“You were probably right,” Devcon affirmed what the young Autobot had long felt, but also agonized over. “’Genitor moved our base to Kaon not long after when the Enforcers started cracking down hard. We signed up with the ‘Cons. Living with thems showed me I didn’t want to be one... But it didn’t happen right away, you know? It took more stellar-cycles, more jobs than I like to admit before I made my break.”

 

“I’m glad you did,” Smokescreen said. “I always thought you were too good a mech to be tangled up with Lockdown.”

 

“Thanks,” the bountyhunter replied, a slightly melancholy smile graced his lipplates. “That’s why you and me always rubbed along so well. We wanted our progenitors’ approval so bad that we let them twist us up.”

 

“You’re right,” the rookie op agreed, solemnly. “Sometimes I catch myself thinking like him, and I have to pull back. It’s easier now. Jazz is a great teacher.”

 

“He spooked me when he first offered me a job, back when I was calling myself Neutral,” Devcon revealed. “But I knew him as Meister then... Well you know his reputation around ‘Con circles... Right? After a while he came to me as Jazz and suggested I sign up with the Autobots, and just take bounties from them. I didn’t see how it could work, but it felt... right. Best move I’ve made.”

 

“That sounds like Jazz,” Smokescreen replied with a broad smile. He was grateful that his mentor had seen enough potential to want him signed on to the Autobots. Devcon would not now be sitting with Smokescreen otherwise, it almost felt like the work of the Guiding Hand.

 

“When I was dropping off my bounty I heard the Vanguard talking about the new Praxian tactician,” the Altihexian said, tone noticeably more cautious. “Called him the Praefectus... Is that true? Is your originator here?”

 

“It’s true,” the Praxian confirmed, the shrug of his doorwing was a bit forced as he tried to appear more at ease with it all that he actually was. “It’s weird as all frag. I ran away more from him than Praxus, and it slagged me right off that he thought he out to waltz into Iacon and tell the Autobots what to do.”

 

“Did he win you over?” Devcon asked.

 

“The thing about my origin is that he’s right, a lot,” Smokescreen explain, a pensive half from on his face, and a dip to his doorwings. Speaking of his originator was never an entirely comfortable process, the more often he did, the better an understanding, and even an appreciation he developed. “Not about everything, but he is not wrong a lot, not about Enforcer exercises or strategy things. It’s not that he won’t admit to being wrong, it’s just I think he hates being wrong so he practically burns out his processor trying to make sure he isn’t.”

 

“I think he spooks me more than Meister did,” the bounty hunter confessed. “And I’ve never actually met him.”

 

“You don’t have to worry about him turning up,” the gambler reassured him. The idea that Prowl intimidated Dev was not shocking. Smokescreen was leery of ever letting the two meet. There was no way his originator would approve of the mech, and it was not a fight the Praxian had energy to deal with right at this this klik. “He’s with Jazz on an op.”

 

“You must be freaked out,” Devcon said, squeezing Smokescreen’s shoulder. Grateful the concern, grateful for the Altihexian’s presence, the rookie operative leaned into his old friend’s, old Amica’s touch.

 

Devcon’s servo stayed on Smokescreen’s shoulder for what felt like a long time. They did not speak now, the Praxian thought they were both afraid to ruin the moment by saying the wrong thing. Smokescreen glanced up to look at his former Amica’s faceplates. His spark fluttered as his tank twisted. Dev looked unsure, and nervous, exactly how Smokescreen was feeling. It was hard to resist the urge to grab the other mech, to make a fool of himself as he kissed Devcon stupid. Resist Smokescreen did, however. Origin would be so proud to learn that his elder creation had finally learned restraint. Smokescreen almost scowled at the thought of his originator This was no time to think of procreators, of their approval or their scorn. The rebellious youngling still living in his processor almost made the rookie op through caution and restraint to the wind, but he had more to lose by being impulsive than he could hope to gain.

 

This prolonged touch had to be a sign, a signal of the affection Devcon must have still felt. Though he was confident when it came to catching his bounties, and just in general, the Altihexian had always been the more uncertain, more shy when it had come to his and Smokescreen’s young romance. The Praxian had never learned if this was because Devcon was afraid of hurting Smokescreen, or if he as afraid that Smokescreen would hurt him. It had been careless, impulsive young Smokescreen who had made the first move on Devcon, only after they had danced around each other for stellar-cycles. They were dancing around each other again, and as much as he felt his tank was going to fall to his peds, Smokescreen was not willing to miss this chance.

 

“So...” He said, all false charm and confidence. “I could show you around Iacon... or maybe, just my place? Unless you have somewhere to be.”

 

“No, uh, yes,” Devcon stumbled over his reply. He stopped long enough to laugh at himself, to laugh and _them_ , and Smokescreen. Finally, when they were both finished laughing, the Altihexian finished what he had been trying to say. “Yes, I want to see your place... I don’t have anywhere I need to be. Not for a while.”

 

***

 

Hope was not an emotion Prowl paid much focus to. Chromedome had called him too fatalistic to hope for the best. The mech had not been precisely been correct, though he had not been entirely wrong. Prowl had learned to stop indulging that emotion, perhaps more than any other. Waiting mega-cycle after mega-cycle, and quartex after quartex for his pleas to be answered, to be freed from the Institute had killed any inclination the Praxian had ever had to cling to something so fickle as hope. So Prowl did not hope for the best, instead he worked his tactical systems hard, for as long as was necessary, to produce a plan that would provide the best odds of success. Prowl did not hope for the best, he worked tirelessly to pull the best results from the worst situations.

 

Now was no different. As he quietly climbed the rudimentary staircase once utilized during the aborted construction of the atrium, Prowl was not all together confident Jazz’s rather thin plan would succeed. Unable to simply wait and see what might be, he threw himself into planning. Every obstacle, every possible hiding place was run through his battle computer. Every possible reaction Scrounge might have, so far as Prowl could imagine, was run through the Praxian’s simulator, the results then saved to his battle computer. It had been vorns since Prowl had been on the field, faced with the responsibility of covering another mech’s back. He did not hope that he would not fail; he refused to fail.

 

The second storey of the atrium was unfinished, with no barriers to stop a mechanism from walking off the ledge. It gave Prowl an almost perfect view of the floor below. As quietly as possible, the Praxian inched towards the edge of the floor, and took position behind one of several support pillars lining the opening. Somewhere below, Jazz was stalking his quarry. Somewhere below was an enemy that had trained under the Polihexian, who knew at least some of the mech’s tricks. Though the saboteur had appeared confident in his ability to capture and restrained his reprogrammed operative, Prowl was not. It gave him no pleasure to imagine that one of his first acts as an Autobot might be to end the life of another.

 

As he listened, and watched, Prowl accessed the data-net. That is to say, he attempted to access it. The tactician was taken aback to discover his access blocked. Was it possible that there was something in the construction site somehow blocking access? Yes, but it was unlikely. It was far more likely that Legonis had ordered it blocked to prevent media coverage of the riots. The image of the dead mech sprawled steps from the reprogrammed Enforcers appeared in Prowl’s HUD. Scenes like that one were probably playing out across Rodion, with many Enforcers likely laying dead as well. Legonis would not want those images broadcast Cybertron wide. There were limits to how much anarchy the Prime, the Autobot generals, even the Senate would accept before stepping in, whatever Rodion’s Lord might say.

 

Another thought, and another concern, shifted the tactician’s focus. Though some mechanisms, a minority of them, had long range comms installed in their processors, most mechanisms relied on the Communication-Grid to communicate with friend and kin across the planet. This grid was inter-connected with the data-net. Before Prowl even checked the grid, his tactical systems had concluded that the chance it was accessible were close to nil. As per usual, his battle computer’s analysis was correct. Rodion had been cut off from the Communication-Grid. Jazz had long range comms, Prowl had learned early on, but he himself did not.

 

Before Prowl could pay this development any further attention, the building rocked. All thought of the Communication-Grid and the data-net evaporated as the tactician put all of his focus into this new, and considerably more dire development. There were dozens of things that could have caused the building, only partially built, and long abandoned to the elements, but Prowl had very little doubt that it had been the shock wave of a bomb blast. His optics darted around the skeletal structure that made up building above his helm. What had been built of the structure appeared to be sound, but the shopping centre simply did not have the same structural integrity of a completed building. If a blast was close enough, and big enough, the building could fall on their helms.

 

Rioters had broken that feeble Enforcer line, that much was clear to Prowl. Either they were out of control, enraged enough to wreak havoc for the simple sake of it, or they were intent on joining the mayhem at the docks. Leaving his doorwings to watch for an impending collapse, the tactician looked back down at the floor below him. There was no movement. The rattling of the building had likely startled both Jazz and Scrounge. The Special Ops commander was indeed a master of his craft, though the Praxian knew Jazz was moving somewhere below, he had yet to see or here the mech. Though this was unsettling to the tactician, it was for the best. If Prowl saw Jazz it was likely that Scrounge would as well.

 

A second blast, far closer, perhaps even more powerful, shook the construction site, and Prowl clutched the column he was hiding behind for fear of being shaken right off the ledge. That explosion had been close enough to hear, close enough that his doorwings sensors buzzed angrily, and his audials stung. They could not stay here. There was no way they would be able to transport Scrounge from the Dockyards, resisting every step, and there was no way they would be able to locate the Decepticon lab. Suddenly, Prowl spotted a flash of gold darting from behind a half wall off to the side of the mezzanine. Recognizing the mech as Scrounge from holo-captures he had been given, the tactician raised his rifle, but maintained cover as his ATS continued to list all manner of ways this operation might go terribly wrong.

 

A black and white blur cut across Scrounge’s path, set to block to cut off the fleeing operative. Prowl moved from behind the column held his rifle steady. Scrounge was small, and agile, but it appeared as though Jazz did know all his moves. The minibot transformed into a strange disk shaped alt-mod, and spun at the Polihexian as if to dart between the large mech’s legs. A well executed kick from Jazz sent Scrounge flying. He landed almost directly below where Prowl was crouched, behind the same half-wall he had appeared from. For a moment the minibot was still, and Jazz cautiously began to cross the room to where the his operative had fallen. From above, his vision not obscured by the half-wall, Prowl saw Scrounge move. He knew that his partner had not.

 

There was something in the gold mech’s servo. The Praxian was on his peds the moment he saw the device, and it’s dull green glow. As Jazz took another step forwards, Prowl jumped. A sharp cry of alarm broke from Scrounge’s vocalizer as Prowl landed nearly on top of him. As the tactician had witnessed, the minibot was an agile and experienced operative, and Prowl’s training in Diffusion only truly levelled the playing field, it did not give the Praxian any real advantage. With his rifle discarded in his subspace, Prowl relied on his size and his skills to herd Scrounge into a corner.

 

Each time the minibot raised his servo to through the EMP grenade, Prowl moved to block him. The game of Triad went on for a klik, perhaps more. With Scrounge hampered by the grenade in one servo, the Praxian soon had the advantage. In an act of desperation, Scrounge rushed the him. Prowl had the minibot airborne on reflex, throwing the much smaller mech with ease. As the minibot flew through the air, the Praxian saw the EMP grenade’s glow shift from green to red, and it flashed in all too familiar a pattern. Time all but stopped, and for what felt like a klik, Prowl made optic contact with Jazz, who stood just steps away with a blaster aimed low.

 

“He has an EMP grenade,” Prowl said. “Run, Jazz!”

 

Scrounge fumbled with the grenade, Prowl fell on top of him, not seeing if the Polihexian had obeyed or not. Determined to get a hold of the device, or to at least keep it on _this_ side of the low wall, the tactician struggled with the slippery little mech. For a few nanokliks minibot fought like a wild mechanimal, and Prowl matched him strike for strike. In back of his processor, the ATS was counting down. With time running out quickly, the Praxian finally got his servos around Scrounge shoulders, and he slammed the mech against the metal floor not once, but twice. Prowl had incapacitated the mech, but too late. There was no time left to deactivate the grenade, not even enough to truly get clear.

 

“Prowl!” Jazz called, only steps away. A flare of panic shot through Prowl’s spark.

 

“Cover your helm!” He yelled. Another violent explosion from the streets shook the floor, and Prowl found himself falling backwards as his ped was caught in some construction debris. Before he could compensate, the building was rocked by another explosion. Absent, and detached, the tactician now recognized it as rock it fire. He hit the floor hard, on his back. Burning hot pain shot through his right doorwing, and his optics flew open as he bit back a scream. Prowl raised his helm as he instinctively tried to lift his weight off his injured doorwing.

 

As he did, he made optic contact with Scrounge, and the grenade exploded.


	19. Chapter 19

“No, no, no!”

 

It was not until the buzzing in his audial horns faded some that Jazz realized he was shouting. The last bomb blast had sent the walls along the front, and sides of the shopping centre crumbling outwards, and along with the inexplicably powerful blast from Scrounge’s grenade, had rattled the Polihexian’s processors. He finally found his peds, and leapt over the wall that separated him from his teammate. Jazz almost landed on top of the prone Praxian, and his spark almost guttered. Several steps away, Scrounge lay equally inert. His agent was not the saboteur’s priority in this instance, and Jazz would cringe at his own disloyalty later, but if he had to drag one damaged comrade through the chaos of Rodion, it would be Prowl. It had to be Prowl. The Polihexian had no explanation for this unshakable decision, and he wasted no time trying to come up with one. As knelt next to the Praxian, Prowl stirred. Jazz could taste relief, the emotion was so all consuming. Prowl groaned, and onlined his optics.

 

“Thank Primus,” Jazz said. He gave the tactician a once over, the sparking in his right knee was worrisome, but Prowl would not be the first mech or femme the saboteur had to help limp from danger. “Can you get up? Bombs’ve gotten too close. We’re done if we don’t move.”

 

“Jazz,” Prowl rasped, and almost fell back as he sat upright, pain flooding his previously neutral field. It did not take an expert optic to understand the source. Like his right knee, Prowl’s right doorwing joint was sparking as it hung limp, and badly dislocated.

 

“Frag,” the Polihexian swore, keeping calm, though really he felt anything but, Jazz took a jet injector from the medkit in his subspace, loaded it with a pain blocker and injected it into the coolant line along the left side of Prowl’s neck.

 

“You’re uninjured?” The tactician asked with a rough intake. He was keeping upright now, though it looked like a struggle.

 

“Ya, you’re the one that’s slagged,” Jazz replied, and it enraged him. “Don’t think we’re gettin’ far with your door hangin’ like that. Smokey ran me through what to do if one of his doorwings go dislocated. Ain’t ever done it, but...”

 

“Proceed,” Prowl ordered, though his posture, and gritted denta belayed pain, his field had neutralized. “Quickly. Please.”

 

“One... Two...” The saboteur took hold of the limp doorwing, lined it up with it’s joint and popped it back in. Prowl vented sharply but did not scream, and he gingerly shifted the injured sensory panel. Jazz watched, to his relief the doorwing seemed to have slid in correctly.

 

“It will do,” the Praxian said.

 

Through the rubble Jazz saw fire, and heard the mob’s screaming reach a fever pitch. Jumping to his peds, he scrambled over to Scrounge, and slapped stasis cuffs on the minibot. With as much care as he could afford, Jazz draped the little gold mech over his shoulder and returned to Prowl just as the Praxian was trying to stand. By some miracle, Prowl managed to keep his balance, and though his knee was sparking angrily, it seemed to hold his weight. The ground shook, again and the tactician wobbled, Jazz lunged forward, and wrapped his arm around his partner’s lower back, and in reflex Prowl did the same to him.

 

“Jazz,” Prowl said.

 

“We gotta go,” the Polihexian interrupted with real urgency. “I can hear’em comin’.

 

Whatever Prowl had meant to say, he elected to keep silent. They did not so much run as stagger through the rubble, searching for a gap large enough to walk through. Every time a bomb hit, and they were coming closer and closer together, and crashing closer too, they stumbled, but somehow the Autobots managed to keep going. Finally they found their escape, as some crumbled scaffolding had managed to support a half fallen wall enough to leave the mechs a narrow opening. Jazz, with Scrounge slipped through first, with Prowl following immediately after. From the hiss he emitted, the saboteur guessed that Prowl had scrapped a doorwing squeezing through the rough opening, but all he could do was put his arm around the tactician’s back, and lead him on again.

 

Out of the rubble, Jazz could finally appreciate the full severity of the Rodion riots. Rebels had indeed found military grade weapons, and they using them against the Enforcers and paramilitary mechanisms attempting to herd them into a corner, the specific corner in question appeared to be the very construction site Jazz and Prowl were trying to escape from. With the city-state going to Pit, and quickly, Jazz tested his comms, and found nothing but error messages. He swore, it was hardly a surprise, considering he had been in the way of an EMP blast, but the confirmation of his fears only elevated the severity of their situation. They had to get out of Rodion, they had to get out alone. The best way out that Jazz could think of was just about straight through the Dockyards’ riot.

 

“Your comms down too,” Jazz asked in a whisper. Prowl nodded in response. The saboteur scanned the crowd, trying to find some way to skirt around the worst of it. “We’re on out own. Can’t call evac, can’t wait for it. I got us a way out but we’re going to have to go through that.”

 

“Understood,” Prowl replied. He dropped his arm from around the Polihexian’s back. “My knee is holding. It would be best if we could move independently.”

 

“You sure?” The saboteur asked, letting go of the other mech. True to his glyph, Prowl kept his peds. Nodding with approval, Jazz gestured to the left. “This way, come on!”

 

With the chaos on all sides of them, and mechs and femmes running in and out of the fray, no one paid the three mechs any mind. Jazz kept away from the worst of the crowd, falling back more than once to close the different between him and the Praxian limping after him. Prowl’s faceplates were strained, and his optics unfocused, but he kept up. The scream of missiles caused the mob to spread out in all directions, crashing into the Autobots, and for a moment, separating Jazz from his partner. As he found to keep hold of Scrounge, the saboteur tried to find Prowl in the crush. It was the Praxian that found Jazz, by almost stumbling into him. To the Polihexian’s surprise, Prowl pushed passed him, and all but fell against the fallen wall of one of the many rusted out warehouses that filled the Dockyards.

 

“Prowl!” Jazz almost snarled. “Come on.”

 

“A moment,” Prowl said, not looking at the saboteur. When Jazz touched him, the Praxian jerked away as if he had been scalded. Alarmed, the Polihexian caught Prowl’s chin and turned the mech’s face to look at him. Prowl’s optics seemed to stare off into the distance, into the mayhem? Could he be panicking?

 

“Prowl, look at me,” the saboteur ordered, trying to get his partner to snap out of whatever trap his processor had put up.

 

“I cannot,” the tactician replied, shaking his helm free. “My optic cortex is offline. I need to recalibrate.”

 

“Offline!” Jazz all but shrieked. “Are you blind, Prowl! Why the frag didn’t you say anythin’?”

 

“We needed to move,” Prowl said. “You said as much. Please, Jazz. I need to recalibrate!”

 

“What the frag?” The Polihexian hissed. “We don’t have time to trouble shoot, we gotta go!”

 

“I can see without my cortex,” the Praxian countered with some heat. “But you need to let me recalibrate my sensors.”

 

At this Jazz sat back, plating flared, temper neither quite flaring nor fading. Prowl had tried to mention this little fact when he had been finding his bearings, and he was being to well manner to call Jazz on it. The saboteur did not know whether to be annoyed about this or not. Whatever recalibrating Prowl needed to do, he had it done in under a bream. Glyphlessly, he staggered to his peds, doorwings spread wide, for balance perhaps? Jazz stood with considerably more grace, and taking the tactician by the elbow, he started off again. However awkward or odd it might look to any mechanism that actually looked at them, Jazz was not willing to get separated again. The mob reformed, sweeping the Autobots into the mass of angry mechanisms. Though they struggles to break into an open space, the mob pushed on wards. Jazz heard a choked gasp as somebot pushed against Prowl’s doorwings. Snarling, the Polihexian turned and made a quick swipe at the constructionbot who looked to be about to give Prowl another push. It was the larger mech’s turn to gasp as Jazz raked his claw tipped digits across the constructionbot’s chassis. Energon flowed from the deep gauges.

 

“We are being encircled,” Prowl said, a layer of static distorted his monotone. Jazz was not the only mechanism that heard the statement, and the rioters/revolutionaries that surrounded them all suddenly took notice to the lone Praxian in their midst.

 

“What’re you talking about?” The mech Jazz had just damaged asked, voice sharp and high.

 

“Units of either Enforcers or militia are closing in from all corners,” the tactician replied, more for Jazz’s benefit that the Rodion mech. “Once we are too tightly crowded to move freely they will either utilize heavy artillery or air assault to wipe us out.”

 

“Better take his glyph for it,” Jazz warned, voice raised to carry over the bristling crowd. “Mech knows this slag. Well, P...artner, what’dya say we do?”

 

“We need to spread out,” Prowl replied. “Heavy artillery is less effective against free moving targets.”

 

“How are we supposed to spread out?” A speedster with blue paint asked. With his raised voice brought the attention of more rioters. “They’ll shoot us!”

 

“Those amongst us arms need to disperse the Enforcers,” the Praxian declared. “Before your consciences trouble you, take note. The Enforcers have been reprogrammed, they in turn have reprogrammed your kin, those that were released from custody “changed”. If you are captured alive, that fate is yours.”  


“Regrogrammed!” A red and orange labourmech gasped. “That’s why Ammo backed out, why our union brothers and sister have been disappearing! It’s Shadowplay!”

 

“No one’s reprogramming me!” The blue racer proclaimed.

 

Chants of defiance rose from the crowd as knew of the reprogrammings spread like wildfire. Prowl stood at the centre of it, the conductor of the scene, and Jazz could not have been more impressed. He had stirred up riots, and chaos in Kaon and Polihex when on missions, sabotage was not just a matter of blowing slag up, but this was a thing of beauty. In a klik, the mob shifted, still grouped to tightly, as the Enforcers and militiamechs were not just standing still through it all. One by one, those armed with rockets or blasters, and holy frag, was that a tankformer, slipped into the centre of the mob where the Praxian waited.

 

“Split into four teams,” Prowl ordered the ramshackle cluster of mechanisms. Once they had, he gestured to each group, one by one. “North, south, east, west. Push the enemy back, and give us all space to manoeuvre. My partner and I will hold the centre.”

 

“What’s with, BLAM, him,?” The red tankformer asked, gesturing to Scrounge who remained cuffed, and offline at Jazz’s peds.

 

“Reprogrammed,” Jazz replied. “Tryin’ to get’m to a medic, see if anythin’ can be done.”

 

“Cogsuckers,” the large mech cursed. “KABOOM, Legonis thinks he can reprogram us instead of fighting? No BAM-fragging way.”

 

In was unnerving, to say the least, when Prowl loaded his rocket launchers. No mechanism amongst the mob recognized that the Praxian was blind, only Jazz was aware, and he was not going to draw attention to this uncomfortable fact. Then again, the tactician was managing fine without his optics. The mob chanted and heckled as they divided themselves, each cluster following one of the armed subgroup. Chaos erupted in the Enforcer and militia ranks when it was they who found themselves under an organized assault. While they fought back, briefly, soon they were falling back, and as they did, the mob spread out, forcing the reprogrammed enemy even farther back.

 

To the south, the armed mob successfully overwhelmed the unit of reprogrammed militiamechs and took over their missile launcher. Just as they did, a black heli-former strafed fire over the crowd, destroying the launcher, and killing at least some of the rebels that had captured it, and then turned east. The enemy was giving way and falling back except for this line of Enforcers. Something beyond them that had real value to the Decepticon puppeteers, the mnemosurgeons? A weapon? Jazz fired up at the copter but his blaster was ineffective. Prowl fired two rockets, both missed, but only barely. The heli-former turned, and bore down at the Autobots.

 

“Come on, slagsucker, WHAMMO!” The tankformer snarled as he drove up in his altmode, fired round after round up at the copter. “Let’s see you dance!”

 

Where Jazz and Prowl had failed, the tank succeeded, striking a hit to the heli-former in the side. The mech transformers as he fell behind Enforcer lines, and did not rise again. Blackout maybe? Jazz was not sure, black was a common colour in the Decepticon army, especially amongst the copters. Based on his colour scheme, Jazz knew the downed heli-former was not Vortex, which was about as positive a thing the saboteur thought he would find in this disaster. Prowl’s voice soared over the crowd as he called for them to push east. Fighting at the front was not the Polihexian’s way, and he subspaced his blaster in favour of energon knives. He did his best work behind the lines.

 

“Hold...” Jazz barely heard the snarled order over the mayhem. He searched for the voice, knives angled down, arms loose and ready. Smoke from countless fires distorted the scene and he could not find the speaker, and could not find if this was a friend or a foe.

 

A head of them, the Enforcers, their numbers considerably fewer, held their line, a barrier formed with the greyed bodies of their fallen brothers in arms. It was an odd place to make a last stand, and a macabre defence, and the plating on Jazz’s neck flared. These were the coordinates Prowl had given him of his supposed false sighting. Maybe it had not been Barricade, but the saboteur had a sneaking suspicion that Prowl had in fact seen something. Before Jazz could begin to investigate theory, the rioters leading the charge suddenly screamed as they panicked and raced back towards Prowl and Jazz. The Autobots did not need to wait to see what the source of their terror. From behind the line of Enforcers, a massive canon was rolling up, a familiar dark green mech coming up behind it.

 

“Prowl, got a Combaticon and a cannon,” the saboteur said. “Fact that we ain’t seen Bruticus means his gestalt mates ain’t here. That’s about our only blessin’. Can you take out that thing?”

 

“I believe so,” Prowl replied, and he flared his doorwings wide. Rocket launchers loaded, he shifted on his peds, and fired.

 

Three rockets flew in quick succession from the twin launchers perched on the Praxian’s shoulders. They hit home, and the canon exploded with a devastating blast. The Enforcers that had been standing in front of it were gone, not merely killed but vaporized. The shock wave knocked the rioters and the Autobots to the ground. Before Jazz good even think of checking on his partner he saw Scrounge spin off, his stasis cuff on the ground, grey and useless. Jazz jumped up, and darted after the small mech, but the minibot was bouncing around, crashing into the crumbled forms of the Rodion revolutionaries. Prowl reached for Scrounge as he spun in the Praxian’s direction, and as Prowl lunged, and fell on his knees, he caught the minibot, but only for a nanoklik. As Jazz held his ventilations, Scrounge transformed in Prowl’s servos, and wrenched free with a shrill scream, leaving his modified arm in the tactician’s servo. In that next instant, the minibot was gone, lost in the crowd of mechanisms just now staggering upright.

 

Jazz ran to Prowl, reaching the Praxian in time to help him up. He would never be able to say what had made him look up, but as he did, he saw a shadow. All black, with widespread wings, a Seeker about to attack, or the infamous Barricade, it hardly mattered. Three Cons all guarding this one spot, the very coordinates Prowl had given him, there was no way it could have been a coincidence. In one fluid motion, he retrieved his blaster, and loaded it with his last trick, and pulled the trigger. The beacon struck the building, blinking as it activated on contact, almost between the shadowed mech’s peds.

 

“Everybot get down!” Jazz yelled, and he pulled Prowl down, shielding the damaged Praxian with his own frame.

 

Just before he turned helm, the Polihexian spotted a flash of gold at the base of the building, but it was too late. In the next nanoklik all Pit broke lose as a bolt of energy struck the targeted building. Debris rained over the rioters, belting their plating. Jazz hissed as something struck his back. Finally, the debris stopped pelting the huddled mechanisms. An inferno through the shattered building, and it was already spreading to the neighbouring buildings. It was a scene out of the Pit, Jazz looked at the flames as he sat back, and the knowledge that he had likely killed the very mechanisms he had come to save. Prowl pushed himself upright, and stared, optics unseeing at the scene. Soft groans of pain from damaged mechanisms were the only sounds to be heard.

 

It was time to go, before they could get any more tangled in the revolution. Prowl accepted Jazz’s servo and pulled himself up. Silent as the Well, the saboteur led the Praxian out of the dumbstruck crowd and into the shadows. Neither mech spoke as Jazz retraced ped steps he had not followed in vorns. The Dockyards had been busier, less rusted and worn the last time the saboteur had needed to use this escape route. Many buildings had changed, more had not. Rodion’s economy had been bad for a long time. Thankfully, somethings had not changed, and Jazz found the service hatch for the sewers exactly where it had always been, and as it had always been, it only took a little force to pry it open. So close the river, the lock had rusted away long ago, and to this ‘cycle had never been replaced.

 

“The sewers of Rodion and Polihex are connected,” Jazz explained as he flung open the hatch, exposing a deep shaft, and a rusted out ladder. “Ain’t safe to wait ‘round Rodion for rescue. I got a friend in the Dead End that’ll take care of us until evac shows up.”

 

“Darkmount is in Polihex,” Prowl noted. “Megatron favours this fortress over any in Kaon.”

 

“Yep,” the saboteur replied. “We’ll keep clear. ‘Cons got no use for the Dead End but some target practice. Trust me.”

 

“You have yet to give me cause not to,” the Praxian said. “Is the ladder usable?”

 

“Hasn’t been since before I ever used this shaft,” Jazz replied. “Never been a problem for me. You’re gonna need to hold on to me.”

 

“Your magnets will hold my added weight?” Prowl asked, a servo found a nasty dent over the Polihexian’s shoulder. Though the touch stung, Jazz pulled the tactician’s around his neck, and looked down at the shaft.

 

“Only one way to find out.”

 

***

 

The operative’s magnets did hold. Prowl kept his servos clasped with his arms looped around Jazz’s neck. He was almost grateful that his optics were useless and he could not accurately gauge the depth of the shaft. As perilous as their descend was, with Prowl’s survival hinging on his ability to hang on to the other mech, it was a relief to not actively think about each ped or servo hold. Everything hurt. His processor had not stopped aching since he had onlined after the EMP blast, and it was only becoming worse. The high degree of feedback required from his doorwings to create an image of the world around him strained his ATS’s simulator, strained his processor and strained his doorwings themselves. They were not meant to be kept had such a high sensitivity level, and every movement, even the flow of air over them hurt. That one of his doorwings was injured only made the matter worse. When faced with the pain of his helm and his doorwings, Prowl hardly noticed that of his knee.

 

They had failed in perhaps the least critical aspect of the mission, but it had also been the aspect the Praxian knew had been most important to Jazz. Treadbolt and Scrounge were most likely dead in the rubble, and if in the very remote chance they had survived they would still be in Decepticons servos, ultimately, still lost. Prowl regretted this development, but he knew full well that Jazz would be suffering with considerably more regret and guilt. These had been his agents, in Rodion on his orders, and he had initiated the weapon that had brought about their demise, just as Prowl had fired the rockets that had triggered the explosion that had killed well over a dozen Enforcers. The tactician suppressed that thought train before it could stir up his emotional cortex. It was easier than it should have been, but Prowl’s helm ached enough to distract him from any and all thought.

 

He felt Jazz’s peds hit solid ground, and climbed off the Polihexian’s back. Paint shot up his right leg, and Prowl flared his doorwings to keep his balance, much to the displeasure of his right doorwing. Prowl’s helm spun for a nanoklik before he forced the ATS to override his pain sensors, and to force clarity on his processor. Jazz was watching him, though the Praxian could not make out his precise expression, his doorwings drew a picture of shape, shadow and temperature. It was not the same as optics though the tactician was certainly better off than his partner would have been in the same state.

 

“You good to go?” Jazz asked, voice clipped. “We got a few mega-cycles’ walk a head of us.”

 

“Lead the way,” Prowl replied. The ATS would only support the crude patch program a select number of times, and he needed to make the most of his “pain free” time as he could.

 

Prowl did not know how long or how far they walked before his tactical systems purged his program, and pain enveloped his frame. He staggered on a few steps before he collided with the Polihexian and found himself wrapped up in the other’s arms. A jet injector was against his neck in the next instance, and its contents injected into Prowl’s coolant line a nanoklik later. The tactician vented a harsh breath as the combination of self-repair nanites, and a pain blocker flooded his systems. It was not enough to bring Prowl complete relief, and the relief it gave came at the cost of a muddled processor, but the tactician could not bring himself to complain.

 

“Thank you,” he said.

 

“You’re more than halfway slagged, aren’tcha?” Jazz observed. “How’s the blocker holdin’?”

 

“It is effective,” Prowl replied, slowly. His processor felt like it was flooded with tar.

 

“We’re gettin’ close to one of my bunks,” the Polihexian revealed. “Don’t wanna tryin’ doctor you in this muck. Think you can last?”

 

“Yes,” the tactician said. “Proceed.”

 

He still hurt, and still rather badly, but it was a manageable pain. The fog in his processor was less manageable, and Prowl felt distinctly vulnerable. Should they be attacked, the tactician was uncertain if he would be able to utilize the ATS in any meaningful way, or contribute to their defence. It was this effect that had always made Prowl stay well clear of blockers. Some mechanisms reacted more strongly to them, and the Praxian was one of them. His ATS would eliminated the fog when it eliminated the pain blocker, and ultimately too soon for Prowl’s comfort. All foreign code was treated as a threat, by the Praxian’s battle computer, even with medical overrides. There may have been a way to tweak that aspect of Prowl’s battle computer but that would have required him to trust engineers, and mnemosurgeons with his processor, and that was never going to happen again.

 

“Here,” Jazz announced, and he stopped and what appeared to be just another wall panel. Prowl could not make out what the Polihexian did exactly, only that he had triggered some mechanism, and the wall turned. Rather than a wall, it was really a secret, low tech door. The opening was narrow but Prowl was able to slip through without scrapping either his chassis or his doorwings. Jazz followed behind him, and shut the door. It was a small space, even for one mech, for two it would be crowded, but it may as well have been the Prime’s own palace.

 

“You built this?” Prowl asked, standing somewhat awkwardly at the centre of the room.

 

“My origin,” the Polihexian replied. “’Genitor was your classic assassin, origin was more the saboteur ‘n he could build anythin’, mostly traps ‘n bombs, but he built safe rooms all over Cybertron, in case of times like this. It never occurred to him that that he was gonna need one in Polihex. Why don’t you sit down ‘n I’ll see if I can do anything for that knee?”

 

Prowl did as he was instructed, sitting careful on the narrow slab that was meant to serve as a berth. There was no pad, and no bedding, and it would not be a comfortable place to recharge but it was a considerably better prospect than the open sewer. Jazz knelt as his peds, and placed his cool servos on the Praxian’s overheated knee, his touch felt considerably better than Prowl would have expected. He knew that he had hyper extended at least one cable, and torn some wires, thanks to his self-diagnostic system, a full report required a medic, but that data alone was enough. He had not broken a strut, which made Jazz’s task of field treatment considerably less difficult.

 

The first aid treatment was not comfortable for Prowl, however. Using his thumb digits, Jazz forced the thinner armour at the back of the Praxian’s knee to flare, making Prowl grit his denta as he forced himself to remain still. A thin nozzle was inserted into the opening, and the contents released. Jazz repeated the process at the top of the tactician’s knee, and both sides. Each time the plating was forced to flare, pain flared through Prowl’s leg, and each time the fluid mixture squirted over the mechanisms of his knee, the pain faded. Finally, the saboteur wrapped a broad gel based sleeve the Praxian’s knee. Once the gel sleeve had been attached, it activated the fluid previously injected, and Prowl’s knee instantly felt cooler.

 

“Nanites should speed up healin’ the cable,” Jazz declared. “I can’t wrap your door but I’m gonna inject some nanites ‘round the joint, see if that doesn’t help you some.”

 

“That would be appreciated,” Prowl replied. With an internal command, the armour panel that concealed his doorwings split into four, slid away into the armour of his sides and back. It felt intensely vulnerable but the Praxian knew he could trust Jazz with his doorwing. It only took a matter of nanokliks for Jazz to squeeze the suspended nanites over Prowl’s damaged joint, once he was finished, the tactician returned his armour to its proper place.

 

“We fuel ‘n then we ‘charge,” the Polihexian said, putting a cube into Prowl’s servos.

 

They drank in silence, and drank quickly, neither interested in lingering over the fuel. Jazz inched to the far side of the small berth, so his back brushed against the wall. Gingerly, Prowl laid down next to him, angling his doorwings off of the slab. Reaching over the Praxian’s side, Jazz placed a folded warming blanket under Prowl’s left doorwing, then the saboteur laid down resting his helm on his right arm. Prowl let his helm sag down on the cold berth. Small as the berth was, there was no way for the two mechs not to touch, though the tactician was somewhat discomfited, Jazz did not appear to be. There was no lingering of his own awkward propriety, however. As Prowl’s exhausted systems dropped into recharge less than a klik after his helm had touched the berth.

 

***

 

“He’s not dead,” Smokescreen declared, not for the first time since Hound had summoned he and Bumblebee to the Special Ops office. While experienced operatives sat still and grave, the Praxian rookie paced. “I would know. I would know if my originator was dead.”

 

“The orbital strike is Jazz’s big finish,” Bumblebee said. “He’s probably still kicking too.”

 

“I’ve confirmed the strike came from Wheeljack’s satellite,” Hound replied. “We’ve had no communication from our team, but some news is slowly trickling out of Rodion. They’re talking about Decepticons, and a Praxian directing the biggest clash between the rebels and the reprogrammed Enforcers. There’s chatter about him destroying a large canon with shoulder rockets. It matches Prowl’s schematics. There’s some talk about a Polihexian, and one Pit of an explosion. Prime is sending the Vanguard in, based on the reports. They aren’t going to be looking for our mechs, they’re looking for mnemosurgeons and ‘Cons.”

 

“What do we do?” The young Praxian asked.

 

“If Jazz is ambulatory, I know where he’s going to go,” the scout explained. “Evac will be on the ground about the same time the Cons reinforcements are supposed to touch down. He’ll track down our mechs.”

 

“You think he can do it alone?” Bumblebee asked. Unlike Jazz, the minibot had never met the Towers mech, and did not actually know the evac in question was a mech from Hound’s past.

 

“He can,” Hound confirmed. “Reports mention a gold minibot going crazy in the crowd. That could be Scrounge, but there have been sightings of Treadbolt. We have to be prepared that only two of our friend’s are coming back, three if we’re lucky.”

 

“I know he’s alive but that doesn’t mean anything if they have him,” Smokescreen whispered. Hound vented a sympathetic sigh, standing and joining the Praxian where he stood. “I wouldn’t know if he was being reprogrammed

 

“No reports suggest either your originator or Jazz were capture, only that they sent the Cons running,” the servus-frame said, and he patted the young mech’s back. “Evac’s going to check the scene, and scout, and if I’m wrong and the ‘Cons have Jazz and Prowl, he’ll get them out. I don’t think they do. I think Jazz is leading your originator down one of his old bolt holes.”

 

Jazz would never allow himself to be reprogrammed, and Hound was just as sure that the Praefectus Vigilum would not let hit happen to himself either. Both mechs had self-destruct programs prepared, according to Jazz, and the servus-frame had complete faith that both mechs would use them before they could be taken, at least in this climate. Hound had assisted in rescuing Jazz before, after he had been captured and tortured by the Decepticons. His commander and friend had survived the capture, the torture, the repairs, as you would expect from a seasoned operative, but the Polihexian would not risk waiting for rescue in Rodion, not with the threat of Shadowplay hanging over his helm. There were enough secrets in Jazz’s processor to bring the Autobots to their knees. The experience with Soundwave had taught the saboteur how to seal these secrets away, but there was no mental shielding or firewalls strong enough to hold a mnemosurgeon’s needles off. No, if Jazz and Prowl had been captured, Smokescreen would know, he would have felt the familial bond snap.

 

“What if the ‘Cons get the evac?” Bumblebee asked, timidly.

 

“Then I go and get him,” Hound replied with unbreakable conviction. “But he won’t get caught. They’ve never caught him yet.”

 

End Chapter 19


	20. Chapter 20

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> I admit, I debated saving this chapter to post next week but it's done, and I'm on to the next chapter so what the heck, we're gonna live dangerously.

There was a certain rush the came from standing in a transport full of battle starved Decepticons. They had no idea Mirage was there, of course or it would have been a rather different rush. As the transport flew from Tarn to Rodion, the Towers spy walked the narrow aisles, and listened. It was not the first Decepticon transport Mirage had stowed away on, but it was probably the most dangerous one. Only steps to his left, Vortex was snarling at the smallest of his gestalt mates. Swindle had played both sides of the war in the millenia long conflict between Autobot and Decepticon. Jazz had even continued to use him as a source when he had become part of the Combaticons, though only for the most vague of information. The Polihexian was no fool, given Swindle’s loyalties were wholly to his credit chip, there had never been a reason to avoid the scam artist entirely, and he did leak good intelligence, from time to time, usually be lying, and trying to steer Jazz in the wrong direction.

 

Mirage had never had any use for Swindle, but he was not the same type of operative as Jazz. The Polihexian was a leader, and he needed information for all directions to give him a quasi accurate image of the state of Cybertron. On the other servo, Mirage was a spy, and only a spy. He was not a leader, loathed the idea of it, and his responsibility to the Crystal City was to watched, and to listen. Without Hound he was only responsible for his own life, and the noblemech told himself he was freer this way, not that he believed it in the least, but if you tell the same lie often enough it become the truth.

 

He was not going into the devolving Pit that was Rodion out of loyalty to Hound, or any sense of duty, he was doing it for Jazz, because the Polihexian was his friend, and because the Autobots needed a mech like Jazz, though they probably would never appreciate just how much. The generals of the Prime’s army would have deluded the majority into thinking that wars were won in battle, when the truth was that wars were won with information, with traps and the battles never fought. This was Mirage’s part of the Game. His task was to assist the Spymaster in keeping the Crystal City out of the war that seemed destined to tear Cybertron apart. While Mirage had not requested permission to retrieve Jazz, he had a well-crafted argument ready for when his progenitor took him to task. There was no hiding from Arcee that he was no longer in Tarn, she had forged a stronger procreator bond between them than was common, or even desired by most. She would not be able narrow his location any closer than the general city-state but she would know what he was doing there, and she would not be amused.

 

Given Arcee was never amused with Mirage, he was less concerned with his progenitor’s ire than he ought to have been. She could hardly lecture him on duty when much of what the Spymaster did was for her ends, for her own vengeance against a mech long dead, than it would every be for the Crystal City. At least Mirage could argue ensuring the stability of the Autobot command structure was to the benefit of the Towers. The Decepticons were as much a threat to, if not more of a threat to the stronghold of the heres-frames, as they were to Iacon, or Tyger Pax, While his framekin had no interest in amassing their own army and fighting a war, the Crystal City was quite happy to allow the Autobots and Iacon to fight the battles for them. In this Mirage thought he had something in common with his framekin, he was not made for fighting.

 

The shuttle bucked, and shuddered as it made the decent to Rodion. With grace and ease, despite the turbulence, Mirage walked to the loading door and leaned against the shuttle wall for balance. He did believe for an instant that he would find Jazz in amongst the carnage believe. When the scene became hot, spies, saboteurs and assassins got out, and the Polihexian had bolt holes all over Cybertron. Certainly, he had more than one such bolt hole in Rodion, many of which would lead to his home state. It was probably a little insane for Autobots to flee to Polihex, but despite the city-state all but swarming with Decepticons, it was probably the single best place in Cybertron for Jazz to blend into.

 

Somewhere, Jazz would leave Mirage a sign, to point the Towers mech exactly where he needed to go to find, and to retrieve his friend. The task was not quite as daunting as it sounded. Jazz would want to be retrieve and he would leave the clue somewhere Mirage would think to look for it. There were more than a few places the spy thought could be possibilities. He had chased Jazz all over Rodion once, and through, to the Towers mech’s disgust, a large swath of the sewers. Those sewers had become a common meeting point for the two mechs, where they had exchanged intelliegence regularly over the vorns, and eventually Hound. The more Mirage thought about it, the more certain he was that Jazz would have taken his escape to the labyrinth beneath the neighbouring states. Which path he would have taken, there were more than the noble cared to consider, would be the most difficult guess to make.

 

With a hard bounce, and then another the transport landed in Rodion. Mirage scowled as he practically dug his digits into the drone-shuttle’s wall in order to keep from falling forward. A low ranking Decepticon activated the door, and it creaked out of the way. By the Guiding Hand, of all the sounds you did not want to hear on a transport was a creak. The Towers mech was grateful he had not heard the sound when he had first snuck on, or he thought he might have raced right back off again, rescue be damned. As soon as the Decepticon stepped out of way of the door, Mirage eased passed him, their frames only a few centimetres apart, and leapt off the shuttle. Despite how close they had come, the Decepticon showed no sign of recognizing their close call, but of course he would not have.

 

Transforming into his sleek alt-mode, Mirage sped off towards the Dockyards at top speed. The Decepticons had landed near the Lord of Rodion’s highrise, and if the roar of guns was anything to go by, the rich hub of the city-state was the current centre of the fight over Rodion’s future. Sometime before the Decepticons, and their stowaway, had landed, the Primal Vanguard had appeared in Rodion. Legonis’ Decepticon reinforcements were in for more than a battle with just untried labourmechanism. Mirage hoped the Autobots thrashed the Decepticon scraplets, but he could not afford to wait around and see if they would.

 

The Dockyards were in ruins, the docks themselves had been destroyed, and most of the block was in total ruin. Because of the fighting still raging, the dead lay grey in the streets. It was an ugly and distasteful sight, and Mirage drove on past it. He checked the coordinates Hound had given him, and came to a halt. It was a mess, an absolute mess. Whatever rebel Rodionians had died fighting the Decepticons here had been cleared away while the remains of Enforcers, and militamechs remained. It churned Mirage’s tank to see the remains of Enforcers but Hound had shared Jazz’s intelligence with him, these Enforcers had been serving the Decepticons and the puppet Lord of Rodion. This knowledge did not make the sight any less hideous.

 

The shattered warehouse was certainly Jazz’s calling card. Mirage had seen the fall out of that weapon before, a final act saved for when simple sabotage could not do the job. With any luck, he had left some evidence of the Decepticons behind. Hound had warned that Optimus Prime would need evidence to defend the Autobot invasion of Neutral Rodion, and before the Towers mech went off to find Jazz’s trail, he needed to dig up this evidence.

 

Carefully stepping around the debris, and keeping himself invisible the entire time, Mirage circled the shell of the warehouse, looking for someway inside. He found it, in a manner. What he found were the mutilated frames of Decepticon warframes laying in a crude entry way carved out of the rubble. A sane mechanism would have taken this as a sign not to enter, the Towers mech shook his helm at himself, and concluded that he was not a sane mech. Lest he leave ped prints, Mirage had to delicately sidestep the congealed energon that pooled under the greyed frames. Whatever had done this was likely free on the streets, it was unlikely to be hiding in the unstable ruins, the noble mech repeated the mantra twice before he climbed into the passage.

 

Additional supports had been added to the basement during the crude lab’s construction, and these thick metal pillars were likely the only reason the floors above had not totally crushed the space below. Much of the ceiling had collapsed, and Mirage would not risk walking to deep, but he recorded everything he saw, as stepped amongst the mediberths, and CR chambers. He nearly yelped when his ped found the disembowelled, and decapitated frame of a mech laying next to a shattered CR chamber. That was... absolutely disgusting. Inching passed the greyed mech, Mirage examined the CR chamber. From the looks of the damage, something, or rather somemechanism had clawed his or her way out.

 

Mirage crouched and looked closely at the claw marks carved into the chamber. Blue paint, he noted, and as he looked at the back of the chamber, he saw more blue and also gold paint transfers. Jazz’s missing mechanisms were a blue and gold Seekerkin, and a gold minibot. While the transfers were weak evidence at best it was still possible that Hound’s fellow operative had been in this CR chamber, and had broken out only to slaughter... Mirage looked at the dead mech’s servos, and applying pressure to the mech’s palms, forced the needles to pop out, a mnemosurgeon. It fit Jazz’s theory of the Rodion question. Shadowplay had not gone extinct with the Golden Age. Arcee would be interested in this development too.

 

With the data-net in Rodion locked down, Mirage knew he needed to get the image captures to Hound by an alternative means. The Primal Vanguard seemed like the only real option the Towers mech had, but he needed to move quickly. To the Autobots, it would seem insane that Jazz was not in Rodion, waiting for a safe moment to meet up with the Vanguard, but the Prime’s elite forces were not guaranteed a victory, and the saboteur would have had no way to know for certain they would have been approved for deployment. As far as the Towers mech was concerned, Jazz was making all the right steps.

 

He climbed from the ruins, taking as much care as before to not make any tracks, and he circled the building again, as he did he spotted a flash of gold peeking out beneath crumbled metal panels. Mirage inched closer, images of the mutilated Decepticons and a hacked up mnemosurgeon were fresh in his processor. As he dug carefully, he found wall panels, and siding, and a large, and very dead warbuild. The Decepticon brand on his shoulder insured Mirage did not give the mech a moment of sympathy or mourning. Pushing the massive mech up as best as his small frame could, Mirage finally found the gold plating he had spied. All but crashed halfway through his transformation sequence, the minibot was in emergency stasis.

 

The Autobot operative had been lucky, though he was unlikely to feel too fortunate when he woke up, almost certainly missing a few parts. He had only been spared death by the convenient demise of the hulking Decepticon. In stasis or no, Mirage was not going to take a change with Scrounge, and he attached a Neural dampener to the back of the little mech’s helm. Next, he took a warming blanket from his subspace and wrapped it around Scrounge before then tying it up with thin cabling. It worked on two levels, one to assist the severely damaged mech entering a deeper, even more critical level of stasis lock, the other to stop him from leaving a mess in Mirage’s cab.

 

Once he had secured the Autobot operative, the Towers mech raced back to the front lines. Technically, he drove along parallel to the confrontation between Decepticons, and Primal Vanguard. He gave them as wide a berth as he could, staying out of range of canons and heavy artillery. Mirage found the Autobot base camp in the northern most transport hub. It was well guarded, but as with the Decepticons they were not able to guard against the noblemech’s electro disruptor and he side stepped the patrolling Autobots, and the guards with ease. A mobile medbay had been set up on one runway, and that was where Mirage stopped. He carefully laid the damaged minibot just outside the temporary structure, and laid a communicube on his chassis. Hound would get his intelligence, Scrounge would get treatment, now all that was left was to retrieve Jazz, no doubt the more difficult of the Towers spy’s missions. As he stepped away from the bundled minibot, Scrounge came into view of the Autobots bustling around the transport. Somemech let out a surprised shout, and Mirage sped away.

 

There were many access to the sewers, and Jazz probably knew all of them, but Mirage had only utilized two with anything that could be called regularity. He drove to the closest, in the neighbouring shopping district, and transformed in the middle of the empty street. You could still hear the fighting, and feel the bombs, and canon blasts strike home. How long had it been since he had spent a quartex in the Towers, not in Tarn, or Kaon? Mirage grimaced as he descended into the sewers. It had been stellar-cycles, probably closer to a vorn since he had had any real respite from his missions. When this was done he was going to take a leave of absence. He was going to get every millimetre of his frame detailed, inside and out, and he was going to enjoy every luxury his service in all these disgusting Pits had earned him. Arcee would go along with it, or she could get slagged.

 

***

 

Prowl woke slowly. His chronometer was registering as nonoperational, another casualty of that EMP grenade. Everything hurt, and the Praxian was almost surprised he had this many pain receptors; it seemed counter-intuitive for such an evolved race to still have some many ways to feel pain. There was a servo on his side, the negligible weight of it did not hurt, but the presence was still, not off putting, but... Odd... It was odd that Prowl felt grounded and comforted by it’s presence. It told him where Jazz was without the tactician being forced to dial the sensors of his doorwings back up again. He would have to do just that when they rose, but for the moment total blindness was preferable to pain that came with the quasi-visual feedback they provided.

 

“Prowl?” Jazz asked. The strength of his voice suggested that he had been online for some time. “Ready to move?”

 

“Yes,” Prowl lied. He was not ready, he would not be ready in joors, it was just as well he was used to ignoring the demands of his frame and he pushed himself up. The world spun, even though he could not see it, and it was only Jazz’s servos on his shoulders that even kept him halfway upright.

 

“What’s hurtin’?” The saboteur asked, concern evident in his voice, his field.

 

“Everything,” the Praxian replied honestly, though he had intended to lie.

 

“’M gonna give you another blocker,” Jazz said. “’N carry you a bit.”

 

“My weight will slow you down,” Prowl argued, even though the idea of walking was distasteful. “You would be hampered if we are attacked.

 

“I’ll hear anyone comin’ in these tunnels,” the Polihexian countered as he injected the blocker into Prowl’s neck. The pain blocker worked even faster than the previous one and Prowl felt absolutely muddled. “Rest some more... I’ve gotcha.”

 

He may have argued but the blocker and the residual ache in his helm had Prowl’s processor running too slowly to have been any use. It was all he could do to wrap his arms around the Polihexian’s neck as Jazz stood. It hurt Prowl’s knee as the saboteur held the Praxian’s legs. That pain faded however, as the wrap and repair nanites continued to work. At first Prowl tried to remain alert and aware, his doorwing’s setting as high as his processor could tolerate. Slowly his awareness faded however, and the tactician’s helm sagged onto Jazz’s shoulder, and his doorwings drooped. Something was wrong, the EMP grenade had done more damage than he had been prepared for. From well beyond the borders of Rodion, a spark called to his. The rest of the tactician’s awareness faded away, and he recharged.

 

Without his chronometer the Praxian had no way to know how long he had recharged on Jazz’s back, and only came back to awareness at all because the saboteur had lowered him to the ground. He tilted his helm and flared his doorwings to track Jazz. It was more difficult for his audials than for his doorwings. The mech moved, and so his doorwings could track him, but he walked nearly silently. Prowl had observed this before, but somehow Jazz seemed even quieter now. Despite being able to track Jazz with his doorwings, Prowl did not recognize him approaching until he was kneeling at his side. The Praxian frowned, this was exactly why he never used pain blockers, they turned him into an idiot.

 

“Do you need another blocker?” Jazz asked, concern easily to teek from his field.

 

“No,” Prowl lightly shook his helm. “I can hardly think as it is.”

 

“Blockers really hit you, h’uh?” The Polihexian hummed with sympathy. “We’re stoppin’ for energon, ‘n a bit of a rest. Then we’re gonna go until we hit my next bunk.”

 

“Understood,” the tactician said. “I am slowing you down.”

 

“If the next thing off your glossa is the suggestion that I leave you, I’m going to be really slagged off,” Jazz warned. “We’d a been slowed down if I’d gotten a full blast of that thing, ‘n you wouldn’tve left me. So don’t try it.”

 

“You are correct, I would not have left you, even if it would have been the sound tactic,” Prowl replied. “Smokescreen would have never forgiven me.”

 

“That’s enough motivation to take a risk?” The saboteur asked as he pressed a cube into Prowl’s servos.

 

“I have done enough as it is,” the Praxian said, too tired, and perhaps still too addled to question why he was revealing what he was. “I abandoned him, forcibly reentered his life, demanded obedience and gave him inadequate attention, and ultimately, I abandoned him again.”

 

“You know, Smokey tells it a little differently,” Jazz replied. “He didn’t paint a pretty picture, but he said you tried. Sometimes tryin’s all we can ask of a mech.”

 

“I did not love him,” Prowl revealed. “Not immediately, not for a number of vorns, I think. I do not know when it started. I suppose it could be said I learned to but that would imply that it was something I tried to do when that was not the case. One vorn I looked at him as he screamed at me, and I wondered if I was going to lose him to Barricade, and it broke my spark. I loved him then, and I do not know when it began, only that it took vorns, and I have never been able to communicate it to him in any meaningful way.”

 

“You didn’t want sparklings,” the Polihexian said. “’N you weren’t sure enough of yourself to leave your clan to avoid havin’em. Prowl, Barricade forced his spark on you, it ain’t a surprise that you’d struggle with the sparkling that resulted from that merge.”

 

“It is very cold comfort to him, I think,” the tactician replied. “Bluestreak is what binds us, and even that has been strained. He believed I would not want him in contact with his brother. I made him think that, though that was never my intent.”

 

“What happened?” Jazz asked.

 

“Smokescreen did not tell me he had been released, and did not tell me he was leaving Praxus,” Prowl explained. “I wrote to him while he was in detention, as did Bluestreak, I do not believe he wrote either of us back, still I was kept appraised of his conduct, and his treatment. I ensured he was kept safe from other prisoners, he was after all the creation of the Praefectus Vigilum of Praxus’ Enforcers, he had to serve his sentence in the most highly guarded wing of the centre, not because of his conduct but because hardened criminals would seek to harm him. I was appraised that he had been released, the information had been delayed and I arrived at the transport hub only breams before his shuttle departed. We argued, a final time, and I said something unforgivable.”

 

“Can it have been that bad?” The saboteur asked.

 

“He told me as he turned his back that all he had really wanted for me to be proud of him,” the Praxian explained. “I told him that I wanted to be proud of him, but first he needed to do something for which I could be proud.”

 

“Alright, ow,” Jazz’s voice had a grimace in it. “Maybe not the worst thing you coulda said but... Ow.”

 

“It felt like the truth when I spoke it,” Prowl said, though an immediate mistake. “I had become exhausted by the endless rebellion, the probation sentences, the expulsions, the detention sentences. He was such a clever spark but he wasted it all to defy me. But I have been proud of him, many times, just not as often as I have been disappointed.”

 

“You’re proud he joined the Autobots,” the Polihexian guessed.

 

“Proud and terrified,” the tactician replied. “I knew you for what you are, and deduced that was what he intended to become.”

 

“That’s why you almost crashed, you were scared,” Jazz thought out loud. “Scared your bitlet was gonna get himself slagged on some op.”

 

“Impulsiveness is his worst character trait,” Prowl said. “I could imagine too many scenarios were he would become reckless and... die.”

 

“I want’m as an op, for sure,” the saboteur replied. “But I want’m for his processor. I think he’ll be a good tactical op, especially when he finishes his degree.”

 

“That is mildly reassuring,” the Praxian said, a sigh in his voice. “I think he’s reaching to me, testing to see if I am alive.”

 

“Familial-bonds can reach across Cybertron,” Jazz replied. “That’s how I knew my family had been slaughtered, I felt them snap one by one.”

 

“You were not in Polihex,” Prowl stated, rather than asked.

 

“I was in Rodion,” the Polihexian explained. “My last show, last assassination for Straxus. I was on stage when I felt the bond to my ‘genitor snap, ‘n then my brother. My origin lasted the longest, but the killed’m in the end. Artfire went mad. He was my backup... He was also my brother’s Conjunx Endura. He went back to Polihex, to get revenge. I went to Iacon, for the same reason, I guess.”

 

“I am sorry,” the tactician said. It would have been horrific, to be on stage in front of thousands, when the bonds snapped, to be so far and unable to provide any aid.

 

“I shattered my instruments,” Jazz went on to explain. “Everything but the cithara Ric’d given me when we were younglings. Don’t think anyone but Hound ‘n his old heres even knows I can carry a tune... I haven’t sung, or nothin’, ‘cept at the party, since.”

 

“Why?” Prowl asked the question that had bothered him for the better part of the orn. “Why deprive yourself of something you loved?”

 

“I was excited, standin’ on that stage,” the saboteur said. “Had it all planned. I was just gonna be Folgare, leave the Fellowship in the past. I was gonna be rich, famous, ‘n as I say that first note, my ‘genitor died. It felt wrong to sing after that.”

 

“You punished yourself for not being in Polihex with your family,” the Praxian observed. “Because you lived.”

 

“Hound’s heres said somethin’ similar, stellar-cycles ago,” Jazz replied. “Still feels wrong.”

 

“I will not claim to understand,” Prowl said. “I have not suffered your pain. You do still have a beautiful voice.”

 

“Thank you,” the Polihexian said. “Never thought you’da been a fan.”

 

“I like music,” the tactician replied. “I do, however rarely take the time to listen to it.”

 

Returning to Polihex must have been a difficult thing. Prowl let his processor wander as he was once again on Jazz’s back, as they pushed on. Singing before those entitled Rodions would have been difficult, Jazz had done, was doing both, for the sake of the mission. He was a dedicated operative, and a strong mech, not simply in his build, but in his spark. The Praxian had never had close familial bonds, even those to his creations were not so strong as they were meant to be, part of the glitch, or part of the ATS, it hardly mattered. Prowl had not felt the bond to his progenitor snap, and he did not believe he would feel the one to his originator. To survive his bonds shattering all at once, Jazz had to have a miraculously strong spark, Cybertronians were not meant to survive such pain.

 

***

 

Mirage might actually beat them to Polihex, Jazz thought mirthlessly as he walked through the slow moving waste liquids that flowed through the sewer. They would have been no faster if Prowl had been walking, given the state of his knee, and carrying him made the Polihexian a lot more comfortable, overall. Prowl was more banged up than he was letting on, maybe he did not actually understand the full extent of his injuries, but something more was off with the Praxian, more than the knee, more than the doorwing, more than the fried visual cortex. Jazz needed to get him to the Dead End, to Ratchet, before anything else could happen. The tactician’s condition was not worsening, thank Primus for that blessing, but the status quo was still worrying.

 

Even if Mirage was waiting, Jazz thought he would have to wait a bit longer in Polihex. True, Iacon had decent medics, but the Polihexian wanted the best of the best to take care of his partner, and that would always been Ratchet, old crankshaft that he was. They were not going to get to Jazz’s planned bunk by the time the saboteur’s struts gave out. He was not going to voice this conclusion, Prowl would argue that he should walk, and Jazz just might break down and agree. Tomorrow, the Praxian could walk, when his knee had had longer to heal, but he needed to stay off it a little longer, and in any case, there were other places to recharge.

 

The very place Jazz had been considering came into view and the Polihexian took it as a sign it was time to stop for a bit of recharge. The raised ledge led to another access to the sewers, and it was a safe enough spot to rest. Jazz would hear anyone approach, whether in the sewers, or from above, recharge did not affect his hearing. He lifted Prowl off his back, and then lifted him onto the ledge before climbing up himself. When he had himself situated in the corner, back braced against the wall, Jazz pulled Prowl onto his back. The Praxian stiffened as the saboteur manoeuvred him onto his side, his helm on Jazz’s chassis, and his doorwings supported by the arm Jazz had wrapped around his waist. It was an intimate position, even more so than the previous dark-cycle’s, and it must have felt a bit precarious to the blind mech.

 

“Get some ‘charge,” Jazz ordered. “I’ve got you.”

 

“You are certain?” Prowl asked, his ventilations were warm against the Polihexian’s chassis, and even as he asked, the tension bled from his frame. Whether it was the booster, or exhaustion, Jazz could not guess, but it was enough to be worrying.

 

“’Charge,” the saboteur repeated. “Ain’t gonna drop you.”

 

Prowl was in recharge in under a bream. This was a mech Smokescreen had said could go mega-cycles without recharge, without showing it, and it seemed all he could do now was fuel, and recharge. Jazz hoped to Primus it was the booster, and not a frightening side effect of the EMP blast. Though Prowl’s spark seemed strong, the Polihexian could not settle down enough to catch some recharge for joors. He listened to the tactician’s ventilations, felt them against his plating, and never let go, never shifted. Instead, he stayed still as the grayed, and listened. At some point, he started humming, and only a little later he found himself singing in a hushed whisper.

 

“From the highest peak to the lowest depths my spark will guide me thru. Where’er you go, whatever you do, I’ll find my way back to you.”

 

He sang the song, from beginning to end, and his helm sagged back, as his optics dim. It had been his origin’s favourite song, and as a result one of Jazz’s, one of the first he had ever learned to sing. How odd it was, laying in a place he had once sat with his procreators, following his origin’s ped steps, that this song would find ts way to his glossa. The compulsion to sing it, the act of singing had not be suffering either, but something more like a relief. And as the lyrics echoed in his helm, Jazz finally found himself able to drop off into recharge.

 

End Chapter 20

 


	21. Chapter 21

“One of our missing operatives was found in Rodion, by the medi-tent,” Optimus revealed as he joined Hound in Jazz’s office. “He was secured in a warming blanket, and with a neural dampener on the back of his helm. I am told he is severely damaged.”

 

“They need to keep him restrained until mnemosurgeons can have a look,” Hound said. “Jazz thought he had been reprogrammed.”

 

“No one saw him delivered,” the Prime observed as he watched the scout with a steady, questioning stare. “He could not have made his way on his own. And this was on his chassis, encrypted.”

 

Hound took the communicube from the Autobot commander, and turned it over in his servos. He knew on sight that it was one of Mirage’s. The design of the cube was in the Towers’ style, and though the differences were subtle, even indistinguishable to many, they were obvious to Hound. After only a small hesitation, he broke the encryption, and activated the cube, setting it on the desk, allowing the Prime to see it play out. Close ups of the Combaticons played out first, footage of the battle between Legonis’ forces and the Vanguard came next. The warehouse shattered by Jazz’s orbital strik, and the remains of dead Enforcers and militiamech. All gruesome scenes, not as gruesome as the next. Several mutilated Decepticons leading to an underground lab filled with CR chambers and mediberths. A close up of a decapitated mech, and of his servo with the needles of a mnemosurgeon exposed. Finally, a blue servo came into few, with small dark blue and gold paint transfers on its digit tips. With every new image, or recording, Mirage never spoke, it did not surprise Hound at all.

 

“Jazz was correct then,” Optimus said, sombre. “What ugliness.”

 

“Zeta Prime probably gave them the inspiration,” Hound replied, making a copy of the cube as he spoke. “Just like the “New” Institute, Megatron is making Decepticons for innocent mechanisms. I don’t know if purging it from Rodion will actually stop it. We’re going to have to watch for Shadowplay for now on.”

 

“I will send as many mnemosurgeons as we can afford to Rodion, perhaps one amongst them has enough skill to undo some of the damage,” the Matrix-Bearer said. “Your heres did well, Hound.”

 

“Now he just needs to find Jazz and Prowl,” the servus-frame sighed. “Smokescreen says his originator is still alive, though he doesn’t have a strong enough bond to say more than that. I have to believe he and Jazz are together, and Jazz will heading for an old safe-suite.”

 

“He won’t have waited for the Vanguard, or army to be deployed?” Optimus asked.

 

“No, he wouldn’t hang out, hoping help was coming,” Hound said. “He would go looking for it. My only concern is that he hasn’t made contact. It tells me he’s damaged, maybe just his comms, maybe more, maybe they both are.”

 

“Jazz has survived worst corners of Cybertron,” the Prime replied, reassuringly.

 

“You don’t even know the half of it,” the scout smiled as he spoke. “He’s survived the pit. Take the cube to the Senate, I think they’ll approve deployment of more than just the Primal Vanguard.”

 

“I will,” Optimus agreed. “And they will. Scrounge will be on his way back to Iacon shortly, and I’ll pass on your concerns on to the medics. He will be kept sedated for his own protection, as well as all of ours.”

 

They had Scrounge accounted for. Given he had been retrieved by Mirage, Hound thought Jazz probably had no idea. The saboteur would be happy when Mirage could pass on the news, whenever the Towersmech was able to track him down. Jazz would not make it difficult for their friend, but he would not leave a trail either, lest the Decepticons pick up on it. He knew his former heres would not stop until he found Jazz, and he knew that his commander would leave him a clue, somewhere, and if he could go no further, he would hide in one of the hideouts his family had used for stellar-ycles, and wait to be found.

 

Hound almost desperately wanted to go to Rodion, to join up with Mirage, and to help Jazz and Prowl. It was a foolish wish. He needed to take care of Silverbolt, of Bumblebee and Smokescreen, and all the remaining operatives stationed throughout Cybertron. Operations would continue, and there was still a final threat to consider. The scout activated the original communicube and selected the final images to display. Blue and gold paint transfers, they could not have come from Scrounge, there was not a single speck of blue on the minibot. These were Tread Bolt’s colours, Mirage had made the effort to show them to Hound because he thought there could be a connection. All those dead Decepticons, the decapitated and eviscerated mnemosurgeon, they could have been Tread Bolt’s work, though he would have had to be crazed to tear the fuel tank, and wires out of mechs, even Cons.

 

A side effect of mnemosurgery, perhaps, it certainly fit. Hound frowned. If the Decepticons had screwed up the surgery enough to make Tread Bolt hyper aggressive towards them, he could easily have even worse feelings towards the Autobots. The deployment of the Primal Vanguard had raised the threat level within Iacon to high, but Hound thought this was not enough. He sent off image captures of the operative to the Vanguard with the order that he not be engaged, and that the scout himself be contacted to retrieve him. The servus-frame did not declare the Seekerkin an enemy, but instead labelled him “status-unknown.”

 

If Tread Bolt returned to Iacon, he would probably slip passed the Primal Vanguard easily enough, no Autobot operative had not practised to do just that. It was one of Jazz’s training exercises. On a regular basis the agents in Iacon had to plan, and successfully execute an infiltration into the Prime’s Palace. Failure required a new attempt, success meant the Vanguard got chewed out for slipping up. On a whole, the operatives succeeded in their infiltrations, more often than the Vanguard succeeded in keeping them out. Tread Bolt, so long as his vorns of training had not been purged, would find his way into the Palace with as much ease as Hound, the scout was certain of this. The question would be, who would he come after, Optimus Prime, or Jazz?

 

Treacherous as it was, Hound had to hope the Prime would be his target. Optimus was well defended, not only by his own arms, but by every remaining Primal Vanguard, and every Autobot in Iacon. Jazz was not in Iacon, and if he proved to be Tread Bolt’s target than the mech standing in his way would be Hound. The originator took his small creation from the containment berth and held him close. He could protect Silverbolt. His holograms were be a powerful enough tool, a powerful enough defence, but it did not feel like enough. It was moments where he missed being part of a team, a pair. Mirage would stick to his side, in a time like this. Hound told himself he had escaped the Aerie on his own, that he could protect himself and his creation from a crazed Seeker.

 

“Hound?” Smokescreen called as he stepped into the room. “Something wrong?”

 

“Evac got in touch, mnemosurgery has been confirmed,” Hound replied. The Praxian made an ugly face.

 

“That’s disgusting,” he grimaced as he spoke. “I heard that one of our ops turned up.”

 

“Medics will confirm he’s been reprogrammed, when they get a crack at his processors,” the scout said. “It leaves me asking if our other teammate wasn’t also a victim. Evac found some paint transfers that might suggest Sky Patrol’s gone insane.”

 

“He might be taking the show here, right?” The Praxian asked. “If ‘Cons reprogrammed him, he’s not going to be to ‘Bot friendly.”

 

“That’s my worry,” Hound admitted. “He’s an excellent infiltrator. I don’t imagine the Primal Vanguard will be able to keep him out, I don’t think they’d see him to stop him.”

 

“So we need to be ready,” Smokescreen declared. “And we need to stick together, right? Two’s gonna be better than one.”

 

“I was thinking that,” the originator sighed with relief that the rookie was on the same thought train as him. “We have safety in numbers.”

 

“Nothings going to happen to us, or to Silverbolt,” the ops novice declared. “He doesn’t know all your tricks, he doesn’t know all of mine. If he comes looking for trouble, we’ll take him down.”

 

“Don’t be overconfident,” Hound warned.

 

“I’m not overconfident,” Smokescreen said, plating flared along with his doorwings, he certainly looked confident. “Failure isn’t an option, so we have to win.”

 

***

 

It had to have been Prowl. Barricade had no doubt, not the slightest that the Praxian that had destroyed Brawl’s canon had been the object of his vorns long obsession. Mech though he was clever, frag he actually was. Those low-tech labourmechs had been scrambling around like half-fried dynametal ducks until the Praxian had showed up. Who else could it be but Prowl? The failure to protect the mnemosurgery operation stuck in Barricade’s intake. Megatron was furious, though former crime lord had been able to twist it so the blame fell at Legonis’ peds. Still, it would take some serious work to convince the Warlord of the Decepticons to give him another command. Of course, it had to have been Prowl. No other mech had ever been able to outmanoeuvre him so well. What was worse, he had no idea where the Praefectus Vigilum had slipped off to, Barricade had been too busy jumping off the building, and saving his own plating to track the other Praxian. He could be anywhere, he could be directing the Vanguards, he could be on a transport back to Iacon. Frag, Barricade had been so close!

 

“You’ll hold,” Medic Flatline declared as he finished working on the cracks, and dents of Barricade’s chassis. “I’m impressed you managed to fall from a building without damaging your doorwings.”

 

“I didn’t fall, I jumped,” Barricade snarled back.

 

“There’s a difference?” The medic asked, stepping back so Barricade could climb of the exam berth.

 

“Ya,” the Praxian Decepticon sneered. “It’s called planning.”

 

“We get this close to a fight, and we can’t even join int?” Vortex grumbled as Barricade joined Brawl’s gestalt at the other side of the Decepticons temporary medbay, set up under Legonis’ skyscraper.

 

“Brawl is in no shape to form Bruticus,” Onslaught replied. “As soon as he can stand, we’re out of here.”

 

“Back to Tarn?” Barricade asked. Where Vortex was more than half crazy, Onslaught seemed to be a level-helmed leader, even if it was only over a gestalt.

 

“No orders yet,” the gestalt leader replied. “You got a plan?”

 

“The Autobot that took your gestaltmate out is a project of mine,” the Praxian explained. “He used to be the bosscop in Praxus... And he’s got a processor like you wouldn’t believe.”

 

“What do you want with him?” Onslaught asked.

 

“Him,” Barricade said with grin. “I’ve had his spark twice, fragged two sparks into him, ‘n he still managed to beat me off. I want him under me, under my thumb. He wrecked a good thing I had going in Praxus, and now this, I want to return the favour.”

 

“Think you can convince him to turn ‘Con?” The twin gun tank sounded dubious as he asked the question.

 

“Not a chance,” the former Enforcer actually cackled. “I don’t plan on giving him a choice. When I own his spark, he’ll have no choice. One of the creations he popped out is still in Praxus... If I get a hold of the runt, Prowl will do anything to protect him.”

 

“We help you, we get a share,” Onslaught said. “Payback for Brawl.”

 

“You help, your gestalt can play with him as much as you want,” Barricade promised. “After me, of course.”

 

“He as pretty as Smokescreen?” Swindle asked. But of course, Swindle and Smokescreen had been friendly back in the ‘cycle. It would turn Prowl’s tank to know that, Barricade smiled darkly.

 

“Prettier,” the Praxian replied. “All that pride to be stripped away.”

 

“Sounds like a fun project,” Vortex interjected. “Does he scream?”

 

“Hasn’t yet,” Barricade said. The heli-former let out a maniacal laugh.

 

“That sounds like a challendge,” he chuckled. “Ya, Onslaught, I’m in for sure.”

 

“Leave Megatron to me, Barricade,” Onslaught said. “I heard Starscream keeps delaying his project... Your timing’s just about perfect. We were getting bored of Tarn.”

 

***

 

When Prowl woke the next mega-cycle, his helm was clear, and somewhat less painful. It was a welcome improvement. His knee felt considerably improved, though not without pain. His doorwing ached, but even that had improved thanks to his lazy mega-cycle spent on Jazz’s back. The Praxian was under no illusions that he would not be hurting badly before the mega-cycle was through, but he could work with it, and through it. With a clear processor, Prowl recognized that the hideous ache of his helm had at least in part been due to his intensive operation of the ATS. Certainly, helm aches from that set of components was common enough, the previous mega-cycles severity was new, and it hinted to some unseen damage. He would have to be careful no to abuse his processor, though how he was supposed to process the feedback from his doorwings without doing just that, Prowl had no clear plan for how he was suppose to accomplish that.

 

Jazz was still in recharge, keeping a tight hold around Prowl waist even offline. It was a more comfortable position than it had any business being. It would be a mistake to interface with him, perhaps an even greater mistake to ever suggest it. The tactician had sworn off such entanglements, and for his own sake he needed to keep to his plan. Without fail, the mechs that had been attracted to him, and he to them had been a series of disasters. Methosulus, Tumbler... They had used him, and he had used them in turn. No doubt they would both paint Prowl as the guiltier party, but it would no doubt be easy for them to forget the number of times they had used his position, used his privilege, and used his frame for their convenience. Prowl had always allowed it, of course because he had found release from his ATS, from his glitch in overload, but the cost of pleasure had proved far too high. For Methosulus he had violated his principles, for Tumbler abandoned his creation, and his pride. That was enough. No, that had been too much.

 

He heard Jazz’s engine hum as the Polihexian woke from recharge. Jazz released a soft vent, as he sat up straighter, sitting Prowl up in the process. In reflex, the Praxian flared his doorwings, remembering the precariousness of his position. The saboteur did not let him tumble, of course, and instead helped steer Prowl around so is back was just barely away from the tunnel wall, and his legs tangled over the ledge, all the while leaving the tactician sitting on his lap. It almost disturbed Prowl how willing he allowed himself be moved, how much he trusted the other mech to keep him safe. Trust was something earned, and Jazz had earned his, but recognizing how fully he trusted the mech was a little frightening to Prowl.

 

“We’ll fuel, ‘n head off again,” Jazz said, voice just slightly rough from recharge. “Think you can walk this ‘cycle.”

 

“Yes, the repair nanites have made reasonable strides in my repair,” Prowl replied.

 

“You’re soundin’ better,” the Polihexian observed. “No hangover from the booster?”

 

“No, it has been purged,” the tactician said. “Overall the pain from my injuries are manageable.”

 

“You tell me if that changes,” Jazz asked. “We’re just about halfway there.”

 

“Understood,” Prowl agreed.

 

There was no logic in defying this order, it was actually the logical to share his status with his teammate, still Prowl knew he would push passed his limits when he came to them, though not too far past. He hated to be a liability. Once they had fueled, Jazz helped Prowl from the ledge and they walked on through the waste liquids. It was not comfortable to walk, but the pain pain in his knee was for of an ache now than hot agony. His doorwing was considerably less far along in its repairs, and it hurt both doorwings to use them in place of optics, but it was not agonizing yet either. This would change, before the mega-cycle was through, the tactician knew he was burning out his sensors, which explained the unpleasant tingle in his “good” doorwing, but stumbling blind was too vulnerable an idea to consider.

 

They had walked a reasonable distance when they to a fork in the tunnel. Jazz stopped, and so Prowl did as well. He took something the Praxian had no way of seeing from his subspace and began to scratch it at the wall. Jazz took a klik or less to complete whatever he was sketching or writing, when he was finished, he stepped back as if in contemplation. Prowl wanted to ask what it was he had done, but he waited. The Polihexian returned to the wall, and scratch his tool against it again. After another klik’s work, with the tool audibly digging into the wall, the saboteur stopped again, and this time for good.

 

“Our evac’s a friend called Mirage,” Jazz explained, looking at the wall, not Prowl. “We met when I was a novice op outta Polihex, ‘n he was considerably more seasoned. We had the same target, ‘cept he was just suppose to spy on the mech, ‘n I was sent to kill’m. I did the deed, ‘n he found me, after a sorts. We made a deal, when our paths crossed, as long as our goals didn’t conflict, we looked the other way. Eventually we started sorta helpin’ each other when we could. We exchange intel here, right here. Scratched code into the graffiti left behind by younglings. Eventually his servus wanted out, not outta the Game, just outta the Crystal City. Mirage made it happen.”

 

“Hound,” Prowl said, as he put the puzzle together.

 

“You made a good impression on Hound,” the saboteur revealed. “He had to escape Vos, escape with a ‘cycle’s old newlin’. Mirage got’m as far as Praxus before he got called on some op. When you gave him your seat he was exhausted, traumatized, ‘n desperate. You were kind.”

 

“I would have given near anything for someone to have reached out to me at any point in my creations’ sparklinghoods,” the Praxian replied. “It was a token, I suppose.”

 

“It meant everything to him,” Jazz said. “You have a friend for life in Hound. He won’t forget.”

 

What a strange thought. Prowl was not a mech that was known for kindness, the idea that Hound would feel indebted to him on any level was odd. The tactician did not think he wanted a friend, for the same reason he did not want a lover. Tumbler had been his partner, his friend, then his lover, and now he loathed the sight, and the memory of Prowl. He did not bother wasting processor power on the other “friendships” that had come and gone, there really had not been so many. Prowl’s life had been one of isolation, forced in his sparkling and younglinghoods, chosen in his adulthood. At this stage in his life, companionship felt like a burden, a responsibility Prowl was bound to fail.

 

“You’re a better mech than you think you are,” the Polihexian declared.

 

“I am a cold sparked aft,” Prowl countered, without inflection. “I do not spare feelings. I work, it is all I do, it is all I want to do.”

 

“Anyone ever spare your feelings?” Jazz asked. The Praxian stopped in his tracks and shook his helm before walking again.

 

“No,” the tactician replied. “It would be argued I have none.”

 

“And we both know they’d be wrong,” the saboteur said. “You’ve got walls up, but I think they’re earned.”

 

“I do not wish to crash,” Prowl admitted. A whisper of frustration slipped through his processor. “I do all I can not to feel, to keep my emotional cortex subdued. I abuse my tactical systems in order to do this. I do not want to be seen as a flawed thing. I would rather be derided for my coldness than for my glitch.”

 

“Optimus will never let you get locked up in the Institute under his watch,” Jazz stated, the tone brokering no argument. “Crashin’ ain’t gonna change that, you ain’t the only mech with a glitch in the Autobots. Chief of Security’s got a doozy of one. Sometimes he needs to see a medic for a defrag, but no one’s suggested he get reprogrammed. I think Inferno would kill them.”

 

“It is still a humiliating prospect,” the Praxian said. “I am proud, Jazz. Being mocked for who I am is less bothersome than it is to be mocked for my processor fault.”

 

“You’re gonna blow them away with that processor of yours,” the Polihexian replied, clapping Prowl on the back. ‘Bots are gonna sneer, other Bots are gonna stare in wonder, more are just gonna respect what you do. ‘N if ‘n when you do crash, we’ll take care of you.”

 

“We?” Prowl asked. He found himself leaning against the other mech and told himself that it was because of his knee, and not for camaraderie.

 

“You’re an op now, Prowler,” Jazz declared. “What’er you do in Iacon after, we take care of our own.”

 

***

 

The Towersmech had forgotten how much of a tangled mess the labyrinth beneath Rodion and Polihex was. He found himself forced to turn around, to double back and to retrace his steps more often than he care for. When he figured out where Jazz was headed, he was going to surface and fragging drive to Rodion. Mirage was hardly the most factitious mech on Cybertron, and he had often joined out in the Cybertronian wilderness that surrounded their home state, and he had gotten filthy during a turbofox hunt more than once. This was different though, this was waste, and refuse, and absolutely disgusting. He might have asked Jazz to show more of the Polihexian’s bolt holes once upon at time, if it had not been so awful a prospect even then. Recharging down here was worse than any other Pit the spy had found himself in. If Jazz had not been a friend, he would not have been down here. Arcee could not have convinced him, the Lord of the Crystal City could not have paid him enough.

 

A sudden rush of sewage washed down the tunnel, Mirage fell onto one knee as it knocked into his legs. Thankfully, the rush lasted only a few nanokliks before the flow ebbed, too late to spare the Towers mech of course, and he was covered from ped to helm in old oil, polluted energon and things he did not want to think about. Cursing, creatively at that, Mirage pulled a polishing cloth from his subspace and wiped off his face, his helm, and every where else he reached. By Primus Jazz had better be alive, and he had better be damaged because if the spy had trekked through detritus for nothing he was going to be very upset. That Polihexian owed him, owed him more for this that the servoful of times Mirage had saved his aft. This debt would be unspeakably high, and unspeakably difficult to repay, in fact the Towers mech thought he would hold it over the other mech’s helm for the remainder of their lives.

 

Finally, he came to the fork he had been looking for, annoyed that he had wasted a full mega-cycle walking in circles, rather than taking a more direct path. One of these mega-cycles Mirage was going to hold a blaster to Jazz’s helm and make him draw out a mapping of these slagging tunnels. Jazz would no doubt laugh at the blaster and tell the Towersmech to pour them a couple of cubes. They had not sat down in some neutral territory and had a drink in ages. At first it had been Jazz rebuilding Autobot Special Operation, and freezing Mirage out, and after that the noblemech had just been working in one Pit or another. He was not even a workaholic, Mirage enjoyed his down time, but his progenitor was what she was and the spy found it difficult to stand up to her.

 

As it had always been, the wall at the fork was covered in graffiti. Maintenance drones did not sweep the sewers with any real regularity, and when they did finally clean it off, it was always replaced quickly enough. Younglings had been escaping into these tunnels, blowing off their responsibilities for generations. They would not at the moment, of course, they would be hiding in their homes with their procreators, praying to Primus and the Guiding Hand for the bombs to spare them. Amongst the graffiti was a crude carving. A wrench, nothing stylistically special or interesting about it, but it was the sign Mirage had been looking for.

 

If Jazz was headed to the clinic in the Dead End it meant either he or his partner was damaged. Based on the route they were taking, and the time they were making, Mirage guessed that it was the saboteur’s Praxian partner that had been hurt, though with the absence of any communication from Jazz, he had to have received some damage as well, at least to his comms. There were many weapons that could knock out a mechanisms comms without frying the making, they were unpleasant, but not really debilitating. If the Towersmech could find an access hatch and climb out of this maze soon, he might yet beat Jazz to his destination. It had been a while since the Polihexian had found need to return to his home state, the state of disrepair the Dead End had fallen into was going to distress him. Maybe when it was all done, and they were safely ensconced in Iacon, Mirage would grant Jazz the privilege of buying him a drink.

 

It took several more joors, and yet more back tracking before the noble spy found one of those hatches, and even longer before he could safely make use of it. He might have been invisible but someone would surely notice a hatch cover flipping open in full few of the street. So he waited until the dark-cycle, late in the dark-cycle before opening the hatch and climbing out into the street. Mirage looked and listened. The Autobots and the Decepticons were still fighting on the opposite side of Rodion’s central district, to the Towersmechs relief, so long as he did not have to drive through the battle, it could last as long as it took for Jazz’s comrades to send the Decepticons running back to Tarn, Polihex and whatever other Pit they called home.

 

Mirage tore down the empty streets for the bridge that spanned the energon river that served as the border between Rodion and Polihex. Though the Decepticons largely ignored the Dead End, some of their number ventured into the district to practice their shooting, their targets being the Empties, others had even crueler uses for the impoverished resistents. If the Eastside of Rodion was bad, the Dead End of Polihex was a thousand times worse. Its occupants were scavengers in such disrepair and fuel deprivation that they were often very literally falling apart. Maybe abused Syk and other boosters to make their suffering more bearable. To afford their addictions, to afford even the congealed scum they called energon, they had to either venture into the better districts of Polihex and steal, at the very real risk of their lives, or they had to sell their frames for a credit or two.

 

If anything had changed, the Towers mech would have to attend to the issue quickly, and give Jazz a clear path to the clinic. All the better a reason to beat the Polihexian to their mutual destination. Halfway over the bridge was a border crossing, made up of four guard towers and strips of high wall, on one side it was staffed by Polihexians in service to Straxus, and on the other Rodionians. The Rodion side of the border was closed. Mirage parked, the lone vehicle on the bridge, not that they could see him. From the looks of the guards, they were on edge, no doubt aware of the battle for Rodion still unfolding. In the low light of the early light-cycle, the spy observed the obstacle standing rather stubbornly in front of him. There were only two ways around it, as far as Mirage was concerned. He could climb the guard tower, or he could scale under the bridge. Unlike Jazz, he did not have magnets in his servos, and the Towersmech did not really enjoy his prospects, but it was this or the sewers, and that did not bare consideration.

 

The fall down to the river did not look particularly survivable, and so it would have to be the wall. There were no guards standing outside of the guard post, and so no mech to side step as the noblemech pulled a climbing apparatus from his subspace. As long as he kept his servos on one end, it would remain invisible with him. Holding crossbow shaped gadget in his servos, Mirage loaded it with a magnetic arrow head, aimed and fired. The arrow stuck to the wall between the guardposts, just centimetres from the top, as the cable attached to it remained connected to the device. Wasting no time, the Towersmech gripped the cable between his servos, and scaled the wall. When he had just reached the top, and was carefully climbing over the spikes that topped it, the energy field evaporated and a pair of guards stood in the gap. Scraplets, if they had only done that a klik early, Mirage could have just walked through!

 

“I tell ya, somethin’ really stinks,” one guard complained. Mirage scowled viciously, they hardly smelled delightful. He dropped lightly to his peds on the Polihexian side of the border wall, and transform, at tops speed he drove for Polihex. Before the Autobot could arrive, Mirage would clear the way in Polihex, and but before he did that, he would find a self-detailer and scrub his plating raw.

 

End Chapter 21


	22. Chapter 22

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The busy season in my industry has hit, yes I am actually talking Christmas, yes I know it is September. I've already put in some overtime, eating up my writing time, so updates may get erratic depending on how it all goes.

Mirage had practically stripped his paint clear off by the time he finally felt clean. There were few self-detailers available anywhere near the Dead End, and fewer that were not crawling with Decepticons but the Towers mech had been persistent and had found one that was temporarily closed due too looting, and to his great fortune, the stalls were still operational. He did not luxuriate, this was hardly the sort of establishment where Mirage would soak away the joors, but it was a safe enough on to wash away the filth without interruption or risk. Once he had turned off the shower, the noblemech let himself air dry. Even at his best time, Jazz would not be arriving in Polihex any earlier than late dark-cycle and with a wounded partner, he was not likely to turn up until some time in the next two mega-cycles.

 

Ratchet was not one of Mirage’s friends, or even an acquaintance. He was no enemy, but Jazz had told the Towers mech something of the medics history with the Golden Age senate, of the injustices he had failed to successfully fight, with framekin of Mirage’s being some of his most frequent foes. As a medic, Ratchet would probably repair the noblemech if the situation ever rose, but he would not trust one hanging about his clinic, and Mirage had no interest in imposing his presence. Instead he would patrol the Dead End streets, discourage any Decepticons that were tempted to give the Empties hanging about any grief, and see what there was to be seen. Polihex was not a focus of Arcee’s but that did not mean she would not welcome some intelligence. That was, in the end, the whole basis of their relationship, what information or service could Mirage provide his progenitor that allowed him the free reins he demanded.

 

Finally dry, and blessedly clean the spy made his way onto the pockmarked street and slowly drove around. There were fewer Empties to be see than the last time Mirage had found himself in the Dead End. Those that were about were tucked into alleys, or hidden under the overhangs of long abandoned buildings. The Towers mech doubted that Ratchet’s clinic had put all the homeless mechanisms to rights and onto better lives, rather he suspected the Decepticons had increased their forays into the gutters and had killed untold numbers of them for their scrap parts. It was sad to think that the Fellowship, a cult of assassins had kept such degeneration from happening in Polihex. But the spy knew it was the truth. While the Dead End had been filled with poverty during the era of the Fellowship, the storefronts had not been empty, and the Empties had not been in such a terrible state of repair.

 

A ruler could not be allowed to become all powerful, they had to be answerable to someone, else things went wrong exceedingly quickly. It had only taken decavorns for the Dead End to descend to this level of disrepair. When you considered the long length of the average Cybertronian lifespan, it might as well have been in the flicker of an optic. Mirage looked up into the distance where Darkmount loomed dark and sinister under heavy smog. The closer you got to the fortress the more Decepticons you found, and that made the noblemech wonder. Darkmount could have been the new centre of power for the Decepticons, earning it more security, and more activity, or it could have been something else, something even more ominous, and Mirage stared at the fortress for a little longer. There was no time to do the recon that would be required to safely enter Darkmount. He would pass it on to Jazz, though the Polihexian probably did not have the operatives available to pull off an infiltration, and he would pass it off to the Spymaster.

 

The spy circled the block around the medic’s small practiced before transforming across the street. Ratchet’s clinic was just about the only building standing in any state of repair, and even it was showing signs of rust, and wear. Mirage debated entering the clinic, it was not as if the medic would see him, but the Towers mech hung back. He looked about; the heap behind him looked stable enough and Mirage climbed it, and set himself up to sit and watch from ledge of the second story shop. It looked as if the last rainy season had been rough on the Dead End, the clinics roof was nothing but patches and acid etched metal. Mirage looked back to Darkmount and the heavy industrial smog. Whatever was producing the pollution was probably only exacerbating the punishing acid rain that came every stellar-cycle and lasted for quartexes. Thankfully those quartexes had come and gone and it would be a half stellar-cycle before there was any worry of them striking again. The noblemech did not fancy getting caught in an acid storm just after getting bowled over by a flood of sewage.

 

For joors Mirage watched. The last time he had waited and watched for Jazz to appear, the block had been lined with Empties waiting for a chance to be seen by the medic, and yet not one appeared now. Ratchet had appeared, standing in the door to his clinic, looking into the empty street with a scowl. He must have known what was happening, must have realized that he had lost a losing battle, but Ratchet was a stubborn mech, at least this what how Jazz had described him, and it would be hard to convince him that he had done his best and it was time to return to Iacon, and if not Iacon, some safe Neutral or Autobot held city-state. Straxus may have left the medic alone this long because the Dead End had meant nothing to him, and Ratchet’s ties throughout Cybertron were strong enough that his disappearance would draw too much attention, but with the Decepticons firming entrenched in Polihex, that reputation, and his personal ties to the Autobots were more likely to hurt Ratchet than help him.

 

Maybe Jazz would take the opportunity treatment at the clinic would allow him to harangue the medic into admitting defeat, and getting the frag out of Decepticon territory. Mirage doubted the Polihexian would have an easy time of it, but Jazz was nothing if not persistent, he was after all the one that had extended friendship to he and Hound. The noble spy had been content to work parallel with the mech as long Jazz had kept out of his way, but the saboteur had worn him down over time, until they had cemented their alliance, and their friendship in the sewers of Polihex. They had drunken terrible engex, the three of them, and promised to come to each other’s aid whatever came in the coming vorns, and they had. Not that Jazz had ever needed to rescue Mirage, but he had given Hound shelter, and a home and that was enough to settle a lot of debts.

 

He was not going to come this dark-cycle, Mirage thought and he stretched out to catch a quick nap. A solid recharge was something the Towers mech never tried for when out in the field. Multiple short naps broke up his mega-cycle, and kept him alert. It was always hard to train his frame to recharge properly once he was back home, and he had been gone so long this time that it was probably going to be a real trial to convince his frame that recharging for a solid quarter of a mega-cycle was actually ideal. All the same, Mirage was looking forward to being tested in such a manner, and to online knowing he was safe and secure.

 

***

 

There was no doubt Prowl was hurting again. They were close, just joors from the shaft that opened up just behind Ratchet’s clinic. Jazz did not want to stop, and he knew his partner would insist on pressing on. Prowl could not be relied to keep his peds if he was addled with blockers, and whatever the frag he had done in his helm to hold back the pain, it had finally failed and he looked like he might collapse at any moment, though Jazz suspected the Praxian had enough fight left in him to go farther yet. Still, what did the pain mean, this level of it? What damage was the mech doing to himself by forcing himself onwards.

 

“We should stop,” he finally said, turning to look the tactician over. “You look like slag.”

 

“In order to “see” with my doorwings I must keep their sensor relays at maximum sensitivity,” Prowl explained, through clenched denta. “As a result, all environmental feedback is unpleasant.”

 

“Ya mean painful,” the Polihexian scolded. “This is somethin’ ya mighta mentioned earlier.”

 

“There is nothing to be done for it,” the tactician replied. “It impossible to avoid some sensory burn.”

 

“What we’re gonna do for it is you’re gonna get on my back ‘n I’m gonna carry ya the rest of the way,” Jazz said. “You need a blocker, or you’re gonna fall on your aft anyways. We’ll try a weaker one so you ain’t so loopy.”

 

“I dislike that you are correct,” Prowl actually grumbled. Jazz chuckled.

 

“You wanna argue outta principle, h’uh?” The saboteur asked.

 

“I am tempted,” the Praxian admitted. “But it would waste time, and energy, and I would lose.”

 

“Good mech,” Jazz said. He lined the jet injector up to Prowl’s neck and released the pain blocker. The effects were not quite instantaneous, but they were quick, and the scrunched up expression of pain that had distorted the tactician faceplates smoothed. As before, Jazz helped Prowl onto his back, and took hold of his legs. The Praxian remained tense, and alert, something the saboteur, and he turned his helm to look at Prowl through the side of his visor. “Turn’em down. I got you, Prowl.”

 

“I am not comfortable with that suggestion,” Prowl replied.

 

“Trust me, Prowler,” the Polihexian ordered, gently. “I got you. Ain’t no one gonna sneak up on us, I hear just fine.”

 

Prowl did not give in immediately, but eventually he did relax, and his ventilations evened out as his over used sensors finally got a rest. Despite the extra burden of carrying his partner, Jazz was determined to keep up a good pace. He knew how to push his frame, how to push it beyond its limits, and that was exact what he was going to do until they were finally safe at Ratchet’s. Though he could not be one percent certain, the Polihexian was confident that Mirage had taken the above ground route to Polihex, and he was probably already waiting, a dainty, invisible gargoyle perched on one of the Dead End’s rusting buildings. A berth to ‘charge on, functioning comms, a grumpy medic to put Prowl back to rights, those were what Jazz lived for in this moment, and what kept his peds stepping one in front of the other.

 

Though the Praxian did not dial down to recharge as he had before, neither mech tried to make conversation. Jazz kept his energy and his focus on keeping his peds, and keeping his pace. Prowl could have had his processor on anything, but the saboteur thought he was probably just floating, addled by the blocker. As much as it annoyed Jazz that the tactician had not mentioned the painful side effects of tuning his sensors so high, there was not, and had been no alternative for Jazz to offer that would not have crippled the Praxian, Being so delicate when it came to narcotic codes was definitely a frame attribute the Polihexian was grateful not to have possessed. He was exhausted, and aching more than a little in more than a few places, but pushed himself on. The broken up recharges of the last dark-cycles were really hitting him now, but Jazz was not going to stop. Relative safety was only a joor or two ahead of them, and by Primus the Polihexian was not going to stop and ‘charge when relative safety was so close by.

 

It proved to be three joors before Jazz finally stopped, and cricked his aching neck up to stare up that blessed access shaft. Prowl lifted his helm and looked up with him. Like the last shaft, this one’s ladder had rusted away back in his procreators’ ‘cycle. Exhausted as he was, Jazz thought the climb look insurmountable, but he deleted the thought, activated his magnets, and climbed. He was feeling Prowl’s weight now, and it was hard to brace his peds as he inched his servos up the corroded metal walls. Still, he persisted, and slowly, painstakingly so he climbed higher and higher up the tall shaft. Finally, Jazz braced his peds at the top of the shaft, released one servo from the wall and shoved the hatch open. The relief was indescribable. Prowl reached up, and started to pull himself out of the shaft. An instant later, Jazz was slipping as his magnets shorted out, and his peds, pushed too far, gave way.

 

He fell, but only for under a nanoklik before Prowl caught him, black and white legs griped tight, just under Jazz’s chassis. The Polihexian released the vent he had been holding and looked up at the tactician with exhausted admiration. Prowl looked down at him too, though his optics were unseeing, his expression was set and determined. With shaky arms, Jazz put his servos against the wall and tried his magnets again. They worked, though the sabtoeur knew he could not trust them now, but he did not need to. His partner kept his legs locked around the Polihexian’s midsection, as Prowl pulled himself out of the shaft, he pulled Jazz up with him.

 

Jazz scrambled out of the shaft, and collapsed on the ground next to the Praxian. Both mechs lay venting heavily on the ground for a bream. When he had the energy, saboteur dragged himself up to Prowl, and pulled the mech up in a crushing hug. It surprised him when Prowl hugged him back, and surprised him even more when the tactician let out a short, harsh laugh. Jazz found himself laughing with him. They survived. True, they were not in Iacon, they still needed to get out of Polihex but they had actually survived. Only now after they had dragged themselves through through Pit did Jazz let himself admit how badly the odds had been against them, and how easily it would have been for the Decepticons to kill them both.

 

“Thank you,” Jazz said when he finally stopped laughing. “That was a good catch.”

 

“Thank you for carrying me this far,” Prowl replied.

 

“Relax for a klik,” the Polihexian said as he climbed up on shaky struts. “’M gonna wake up Ratch.”

 

It was embarrassingly hard to walk the six steps to the back door, and just as hard to raise his servo, form a fist and rap it against that door. Jazz leaned against the wall, knowing his legs could give out if he was not careful. He did not have to wait long, however and Jazz heard the old medics heavy ped steps coming before the door slid open. If Ratchet had been in recharge, there was no sign of it, and knowing the old mech like he did, Jazz thought Ratchet had likely been working on his charts, fussing over his supplies, anything but recharing. Under the influence of excellent engex, the medic had once admitted that he had had trouble recharging since he ‘cycles in the Functionalist senate of the Golden Age.

 

“Heya Ratch,” Jazz greeted. “Don’t suppose you got a spare berth or two?”

 

“You look more than half slagged,” Ratchet replied with a surly look.

 

“’M alright,” the saboteur said, and he gestured over to Prowl. “He’s the one that’s slagged. Don’t suppose you can help’m up? Don’t trust my peds.”

 

“How’d a Praxian Enforcer end up with you, Jazz?” The medic asked as he walked towards Prowl. A full metre taller than either Jazz or this partner, it took Ratchet, only three steps to reach the tactician.

 

“Needed some metaforensics,” Jazz explained. “’N I ain’t exactly overrun with ops, ya know. I just borrowed Prowl from tactics.”

 

“Prowl, eh?” Ratchet said and he offered the Praxian a servo. Jazz coughed.

 

“Shoulda mentioned he’s a bit blind at the moment,” the Polihexian offered, sheepish. Ratchet cursed, as colourfully as the saboteur remembered.

 

“Functioning optics, but no vision, that the visual cortex,” the medic sighed. He wrapped his large servos around the Praxian’s shoulders and pulled him to his peds. “You a bit of a mess, Prowl?”

 

“I believe you will find multiple reasons to complain,” Prowl replied. “I have sensory burn on my doorwings, a dislocation right doorwing that is still knitting, a sprained knee that has largely settled.”

 

“And you visual cortex is fried,” Ratchet said.

 

“’N our comms,” Jazz added. “Nasty EMP blast,”

 

“No point chatting out here,” the old mech shook his helm. “Primus you both stink. It’s always the sewers with you, Jazz. Why can’t you ever use a fragging road?”

 

“’Cause I don’t wanna get slagged,” the Polihexian replied, without shame.

 

“Get a different line of work,” Ratchet said, deadpan. “Except you’d probably get bored, get a terribly stupid hobby and still get yourself slag. Into the washracks with both of you, then onto mediberths.”

 

Ratchet all but carried both mechs into the large washracks next to his office. With perfect efficiency, he used the shower want to rinse the accumulated fifth that stained their plating, and clogged their joints. The hot spray felt amazing on Jazz’s tired struts, until that was, the medic aimed the spray at his back, now that hurt a bit. It had been unpleasant enough carrying Prowl on his back for two separate mega-cycles, the powerful solvent spray stung the shallow scrapes, and the less shallow dents. His hiss of displeasure drew the medics attention, and the spray stopped as Ratchet examined Jazz’s back, with gentle digits.

 

“Why does it look like you’ve been pelted with asteroids?” The medic asked.

 

“Nothin’ that big,” the Polihexian said. “Rodion’s gone to slag.”

 

“I hadn’t heard anything,” Ratchet replied, resuming his cleaning task, but keeping the spray away from Jazz’s back.

 

“Data-net’s down,” Jazz explained. “’Cons... They’ve been reprogrammin’ the Rodionians.”

 

“Of all the...” the medic’s curses took on an even more creative edge than before. “Megatron’s determined to drag Cybertron into the Pit.”

 

“Seems like his plan,” the saboteur replied. Soon they were clean and dry, and Ratchet helped the worn out Autobots out of the washracks and into a large medi-suite. Equipped with two berths, this was wear the medic treated patients requiring over dark-cycle care. It also had one of Jazz’s locks on the door, and it was here that Ratchet always treated him if he happened to drag himself to the medic’s door.”

 

“Don’t either of you move a millimetre while I run my scans,” Ratchet threatened.

 

Neither mech had the energy to resisted the old medic’s orders, and Jazz knew better than to try even when he was feeling fiesty. As it was he sat, hunched, too tired to try and straighten up. Prowl was equally still, but sitting considerably straighter, though the Polihexian thought more than a little of that was stubbornness, and the rest Enforcer training. Ratchet scowled as he scanned Jazz, and grumbled and snarled as he scanned Prowl. Before he had even finished his scan, the medic was standing next to the Praxian, and guiding him into a horizontal position.

 

“Your processor is a fragging mess,” Ratchet said to Prowl, and using a diagnostic cable, plugged into the Praxian. After a klik’s examine he snarled. “You’ve got more burnt out connections that live ones... And... What a fragging mess... and someone’s had their needles in you.”

 

“When I was a sparkling,” Prowl explained.

 

“That is disgusting,” the medic replied. “Fragging disgusting. What sort of sick slag-eater thinks mnemosurgery is appropriate for a sparkling? Didn’t help you did it? That glitch was the motivator?”

 

“Yes,” the Praxian confirmed, but offered up no extra details. Jazz was not surprised, the glitch was a sensitive topic, and Prowl was exhausted.

 

“You’re low on coolant,” Ratchet observed. “Probably fried half of the wires in your helm because that... thing is running hot... I don’t think I want to know why you have a battle computer with that power in your helm. Don’t try to explain, mechanisms always have mods I hate, and have to work around. Jazz rewrites his code at least twice a stellar-cycle.”

 

“Just a few lines,” Jazz insisted, in his own defence. “Can you fix my partner ‘nough for us to get back to Iacon?”

 

“Sure,” the old mech said. “Prowl, even though your knee and wing joint will hold until you can get back to base, I’m going to finish them up now so you can get a proper recharge, and take some strain off your self-repair systems. In the light-cycle I’ll see what I can do for your visual cortex.”

 

“Your services are appreciated, Medic Ratchet,” Prowl replied. “Thank you for your assistance.”

 

“Never trust the agreeable ones,” Ratchet grumbled as he set to work on Prowl’s knee. “They always prove the most resistant in the end.”

 

Jazz laughed and laid down on his mediberth. The medic looked over at him and scowled. Ratchet was probably remembering that no mech was quite as disobedient as him, but that was fine. Despite what the medic believed, the Polihexian did in fact know his frame’s limits, and when he pushed them, it was a conscious decision, and always with a good reason. At this joor, Jazz knew the clinic was locked up tight, with locks he himself had installed and programmed. Outside of Iacon this was one of the few places the saboteur felt safe enough to really rest. He watched the medic work on Prowl’s knee, and then his doorwing, and he even gave a sympathetic twinge when he watched Ratchet use a particularly large jet injector against several components in the hinges of Prowl’s doorwings.

 

“That’ll help with the sensor burn,” the medic said. “Until they’ve recovered, I have them on medical lock down. While I have no doubt you could figure away how to override my lock I am going to strongly caution you against it. If you frag up your repairs I will weld you to a mediberth. You will not be happy, and I will not be happy, and I will take it out on your stupid aft. Got it?”

 

“Understood,” Prowl replied.

 

“Good, now I’m going to give you each a cube of medical grade, and then a blocker,” Ratchet explained, taking the very cubes from his subspace. “You’ve got some dregs in your systems, Prowl.”

 

“I am sensitive to pain blockers,” the Praxian revealed. “They have a powerful sedative effect.”

 

“I’ll try one of my lighter formulas on you, see how it works,” the old mech said. “Same time, you need a long recharge so you can ‘charge off any drowsiness. And you Mr I-Always-Run-to-Ratchet-Half-Slagged, I’ll fit in some time on your comms in the light-cycle too. Comms have been iffy around here for a while... Mostly static.”

 

“Sounds like Soundwave,” Jazz replied with a grimace. “He ain’t likely to wonder out to the Dead End, but it don’t bode well for you Ratch.”

 

“Let me worry about me,” Ratchet dismissed the Polihexian’s concerns and gave him an injection in his neck.

 

Nothing worked quite as quickly as the old medic’s formulas and Jazz relaxed completely onto the mediberth as his aches and pain eased off. Once Ratchet had gone to find his own berth, the saboteur laid and watched his partner, as the Praxian fell almost immediately into recharge. Soundwave could have been messing with comms all over Polihex or he could have been targetting Ratchet specifically. While the old mech may have dismissed Jazz’s concerns, the Polihexian would not be so easily dissuaded. It was time for Ratch to pack up and move on, even if he did not see it yet. If Jazz found any evidence that Soundwave had his optics on the medic, he would have Ratchet on whatever transport Mirage had planned, if he had to knock the big mech out and drag him on board.

 

***

 

Tread Bolt did not remember the flight from Rodion to Iacon. He onlined in a rundown hotel room, disoriented and angry. With the static and fragmented nature of his memories, and his processor in general, the only certainty the Seeker had was that he was enraged. Slowly he oriented himself to his location, and slowly a tiny bit of the static cleared. Yes, he was in Iacon, Tread Bolt clawed through the static, seeking his purpose in the angry fog. Jazz, of course. It had been the Autobot spymaster that had done this to him, taken his processor apart, left false memories, and destroyed everything else. The anger boiled over and the Seeker tore his clawed digits through the cheap berth. Revenge, yes he would have revenge, on Jazz, on the Autobots. They would die under his claws.

 

Dimly, Tread Bolt remembered killing, killing several mechanisms before he left Rodion. The memory files were corrupted, as were all his new memory files, and when the spy tried to piece the fragments together, he fell short. They had to have been his Autobot jailers, yes it had to have been his jailers. He had escaped, yes... yes... A helm rolled from the mech intending to use those needles on Tread Bold again. Anger, pleasure, revenge. Like a turborat he had been caged below ground. At that fragment of memory, the Seeker shuddered. His kin loathed the underground; Seekers needed freedom, they needed the sky. Starscream, the Crime Lord who had done the unthinkable and taken his operations underground, was the anathema of what a Seeker was meant to be, and yet... he was Tread Bolt’s Air Commander? The idea felt... wrong and yet spy could find no other truth inside his helm.

 

Once Jazz was dead, once the Autobots had bled at his claws, things would be clearer. The Seeker could not explain why he felt this to be true, but he clung to it, clung to the idea that sanity lay with the Polihexian. It had to mean killing the mech, what else could it be? Taking on Special Operations should have felt like a daunting or suicidal task, but Tread Bolt knew, in his spark, in his fractured processor, somehow he knew that they were vulnerable, shattered themselves, too few to matter. They would die too. But Jazz, everything hinged on the Seeker ripping the spark from “Meister’s” chassis. Tread Bolt pressed his helm into the berth as his claws tore deep gauges out of the berth. His helm throbbed. There was something missing, something he needed to remember, but when he reached for the memory there was nothing but empty space.

 

His chassis heaved as he vented hard. Tread Bolt gritted his denta as he struggled with his broken processor. Anger, use it, live for it, be it because you have nothing else. He pushed himself upright. The berth was destroyed, and so was the rest of the room. Though Tread Bolt was the suite’s only occupant, and the claw marks were so clearly his own, the Seeker had no memory of flipping the table, the chair, of gauging the wall... of killing the small mech that lay, in pieces, on the floor by the door. Scrounge, no, the little mech was in Rodion. Yes... he had disappeared... escaped... he had... Tread Bolt snarled as the answer eluded him. Pushing himself off the berth, the Seeker walked the few steps to the dead mech. Small, crude finish... this was... the hotel clerk? Yes.

 

The mech had disturbed him. Threatened him. What had he said? Something about Enforcers. Yes. He had said he would call the Enforcers, but instead he was dead, ripped to pieces by spy’s sharp digits. Tread Bolt looked down at his servos and found them still stained with energon. Optics looked on his digits, the Seeker rubbed two digits together. The energon was sticky, congealed but not yet tried. Despite having no memory of the act, Tread Bolt knew he had to have killed the minibot in the last joor. Someone was going to notice the mech’s absence, and they were bound to come looking. Vorns of training told the Seeker he needed to move on. If Jazz learned of the death, he might somehow connect it to Tread Bolt and he would be warned of the spy’s presence. That could not be allowed. Time was running out, his window of opportunity was fading and the Seeker would not allow it, Jazz could not be allowed to live.

 

Tread Bolt was falling from the window before he understood he had thrown himself threw it. He had just enough height to activate his thrusters and fly, and save himself from the unforgiving ground. The glow of the energon river, and the bright shine of the gold paint got Tread Bolt’s attention. The soaring Celestial Spires, the Palace of the Prime standing in the centre of the Autobase under the Great Dome. Target sighted, and processor set, the Seeker flew. Though he could not claim to understand how he knew, the spy knew he could not just fly at the dome, or walk up to it. Primal Vanguards acted as sentries, though they could be lacks, incompetent, though again Tread Bolt could not say how he knew this.

 

An image came into the forefront of his processor and Tread bolt knew where he needed to go, and what he needed to do. Dialing back his speed, rather than attract Enforcer attention, the Seeker glided through the sky, just another flier, an unremarkable sight in Iacon’s busy skies. He landed just outside Iacon Central, the district which helt the Great Dome. It was a shame the dome was even operating, the cumbersome defensive shield was down more than it was up. A prickle of fear wormed its way into Tread Bolt’s processor, perhaps Jazz already knew he was coming? No, no there was no way. Rodion... yes, the clash in Rodion would have the Autobots on high alert. Not that it matter, Tread Bolt knew how to get passed the Great Dome, and the Primal Vanguard the stood at the four access points, Primus only knew how, but the Seeker was certain he had done just this, had infiltrated the Autobot base dozens of times before, just like this.


	23. Chapter 23

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Quick warning. Next week probably won't have an update, possibly not the next week either since I am probably going to be at least 7, if not 12 days straight due to a gala at work.
> 
> I'll write when I can, if I can but no promises. Thanks for reading, commenting a leaving kudos. If you want to keep up to date on my shenanigans or read the pointless ficlets I churn out during my commute, find me here https://anon-e-miss.tumblr.com/

Despite the familiar surroundings, and the highly encrypted lock, Jazz did not recharge deeply, and he was awake and mostly upright before he recognized the heavy ped steps down the hall as Ratchet’s. Glancing at Prowl, the Polihexian saw his partner was still in recharge. He considered waiting for Prowl to online but given how he was with blocker, Jazz thought it would be joors yet before the tactician would be up. Quietly, the saboteur rose. The lock disengaged with his password, and he was on his way down the hall without a sound a nanoklik later. Jazz did not need to follow the sounds of Ratchet’s peds to track the mech. 

“Early even for you,” Jazz said as he joined the medic at the energon dispenser, Ratchet jerked with surprise when he looked up and saw the Polihexian beside him.

“Fragging wish you wouldn’t sneak around like that,” Ratchet replied, sourly. “Dead End hasn’t made my recharge habits any better.”

“Worse from the looks of it,” the saboteur said. “Ever think it might be time to come home?”

“Sure,” the medic replied, and Jazz was genuinely surprised by that answer. “But as long as there are mechanisms here I might save, I won’t leave.”

“Make sure you leave before you’re the mech that needs savin’,” Jazz warned. “Get a long range comm, so you don’t gotta rely on the data-net connection. Can’t come it get you if you can’t call for help.”

“Don’t be fuss over me like a new originator,” Ratchet said, as he reached for a second cube. “I can take care of myself, Jazz.”

“No one survives long here without a helpin’ servo here and there,” the Polihexian replied. “You been that helpin’ servo to enough mechanisms to make Straxus nervous.”

“I’ll look at getting a long range comm, alright?” The old mech grumbled. “So drop it. Come on and sit in my office. Don’t think your friend’s going to online for anything short of a bombing raid, but I’d rather not chance it.”

Ratchet’s office had not changed at all, not that Jazz had expected anything else. He sat gingerly in the chair opposite the medic’s desk. His frame was aching more than it had even those few joors earlier, but that was fine. Pain meant he knew he was alive, and it was hardly unbearable. The grouchy old medic lowered himself in his old, well worn chair, and took a swig of his energon. Jazz knew better than to mirror the action, he had never met a mech who brewed his energon this thick or strong. It had almost as strong a punch as high grade or engex. But in this instant, with the low energy warnings still flashing in his helm, the Polihexian sipped at his cube.

“What trouble should I expect from that glitch of his?” Ratchet asked. 

“It’s tied to his emotional cortex, ‘n his central processor,” Jazz explained what little he knew. “He ain’t talked too much ‘bout it, ashamed as all slag for havin’ it. Only quasi-crash I seen was when he realized his bitlet, my rookie was an op, ‘n his tactical set up ‘n his emotional cortex both went into overdrive.”

“Any idea if that tactical slag worsens the situation?” The medic asked. 

“He uses it to push his emotions down, so he don’t crash,” the Polihexian replied. “Runs those hot a lot, his own admission. He’s sensitive ‘bout reprogramming, ‘n he’s the one that figured out what was happenin’ in Rodion so ‘m betting he’s been runnin’ hot for ‘cycles before he had to use his doorwings for optics.”

“Wiring is delicate work,” Ratchet said. “I know you want to get back to Iacon, but I’m not going to rush this. If he’s got as many shorts developing as I think he could have a catastrophic crash at anytime if they aren’t repaired now. Crashes can kill if bad enough, and I don’t know how bad he could go.”

“I wanna get us back in one piece, him ‘n me,” Jazz said. “Do what you gotta do.”

“His creation’s your rookie?” The medic asked. “A Praxian operative?”

“Don’t knock it,” the saboteur said. “Smokey’s multi-talented. He’s in the psych program at the Academy, ‘n he’s good at makin’ a mess. ‘N he’s just the oldest. Prowl’s got two, second’s in Praxus.”

“Creating with that glitch must have been tricky,” Ratchet thought out loud. “Carrying really screws with the code.”

“He had it rough,” Jazz confirmed. “It wasn’t somethin’ he chose for himself, but somethin’ he thought he had to do, ‘n he paid for it. He got that mod installed to keep himself outta the Institute.”

“Why would crashing send him to the Institute?” The medic asked.

“That where his guardian send’m when he was a younglin’,” the Polihexian explained. “Sounds like he didn’t get out until he was almost full upgraded.”

“What a fragging mess,” Ratchet swore. “Glitches like that need regular maintenance. I thought he looked overdue for an overhaul. I’m betting he’s as leery of medics as he’s got to be of mnemosurgeons.”

“Sounds like an accurate read,” Jazz replied. “So be easy on him.”

“I can be nice,” the old mech said. “Why don’t just have another nap, I’ll be working in here for a few joors so my peds shouldn’t wake you up.”

“I shouldn’t be able to recharge after this slag,” the saboteur replied, lifting his now empty cube. “But you know, feels like I could get a few more. See you in a few joors, Ratch.”

Prowl had not mood a millimetre when Jazz returned to the treatment room. It was frightening to think that a potentially fatal crash could be building in the tactician’s helm. He hoped that the ever fatalistic Ratchet was just overly concerned, but it was not a risk they could take. They would stay in Iacon as long as it took for the medic to set Prowl to rights, probably no more than an extra ‘cycle or so. The familiar setting of the clinic felt less secure than it had but that was no matter. During the light-cycle he would set up some traps, and some bugs around the lobby and back and front entrances to increase their defences. 

Before he settled for a few more joors of ‘charge, Jazz added a pair of stasis mines next to the door. Ratchet knew to announce himself by this stage in their acquaintance so if anyone stepped a ped into the room without giving the saboteur a helm’s up, they were going to get a real zap. Once his paranoia was assuaged, Jazz laid back on his borrowed berth, and got comfortable, or as comfortable as he could with all of his dented plating. He still needed to signal Mirage that they had arrived, but that too would wait for the light-cycle. Despite the kick of Ratchet’s energon the Polihexian was too exhausted to function any longer, and he cycled down to recharge almost as soon as he lowered his helm to the berth. 

It was Prowl’s movements that woke Jazz again, a few joors later. Jazz onlined his optics to see Prowl cautiously sitting up on his berth. The Praxian’s doorwings were slanted low on his back, either due to Ratchet medical block or Prowl’s processor injuries. Though he could have sat up on his berth silently, Jazz intentionally made a little noise to let the tactican know he was also awake. Prowl looked in his general direction and the Polihexian felt his spark lighten. In spite of his distant/blind optics, Prowl looked alert, and settled, not at death’s door. True, that did not mean that there was not trouble lurking in the shorts and wires in the Praxian’s helm, but it did mean that he was not immediately critical.

“How ya feelin’?” Jazz asked.

“Improved,” Prowl replied. “How are your injuries?”

“Achin’ some but nothin’ I can’t handle,” the saboteur admitted. “Ratch’ll be ‘round soon to start on your processor. He’s the best medic on Cybertron, ya don’t have to worry about him touchin’ slag ya don’t want.”

“I appreciate the reassurance,” the Praxian said. “Curious medics have done me more harm that good in the past.”

“He won’t do slag ya don’t consent to,” Jazz promised. “Ratch is about the most honorable mech I ever met.”

Just as Jazz had predicted, Ratchet signalled Jazz that he was coming in, giving the Polihexian just enough time to disable the stasis mines before the medic arrived at the door, a cube of medical grade in each servo. As soon as the injured mechs had finished their cubes, Ratchet took Prowl to his small surgery suite, leaving the Polihexian alone to wait. Rather than go insane pacing as the joors passed, Jazz slipped into the lobby and tilted one of the many notices on Ratchet’s window to a 45 degree angle, and then went about the lobby placing bugs, stasis mines and other traps. Most would only trigger at his command, or when activated during the dark-cycle. 

Satisfied that any threat coming through the front would be suitably hampered, Jazz turned his attention to the back door. When he returned to the lobby, only a few kliks later, the notice was straight in the window. One ‘cycle the saboteur was going to convince the Towers mech to tell him how he dodged sensors, and similar traps, but for now Jazz was just relieved to know back up had arrived. He walked back to the room where he and Prowl had recharged and stepped inside. Though Jazz saw and heard no one, he knew Mirage was here, and he just hopedthe spy was not feeling melodramatic enough to make him wait. Mirage did not keep him waiting, thankfully and he suddenly appeared, sitting on the berth Prowl had previously been occupying. Jazz smiled, his evac scowled.

“You owe me so many times more than you can even fathom,” Mirage said. The dainty mech looked sour, gold optics flashing with irritation. At first glance, he did not look like he had run into any hiccups, but as Jazz looked at him a little longer, he saw the scuffed paint, and spotty finish. Despite their shared line of work, Mirage had always looked immaculate when their paths had crossed, and this was about as rough as the saboteur had ever seen him.

“Did you catch trouble?” Jazz asked, considerably more concerned than he had been a nanoklik before. If ‘Cons were on their tail, he needed to know now.

“I got caught in a sewage tsunami,” the Towers mech replied through clenched denta. “You are not worth that insult.”

“’Course I am,” the saboteur chirped back, grinning at his friend as his fears abated. 

“Of course you are,” Mirage echoed, shaking his helm. “You looked like you’ve been flying through an asteroid belt.”

“Honestly didn’t feel it ‘til we got here,” Jazz said, making a face as he tried to stretch. “Just my platin’, ‘n my comms.”

“Naturally, or you would have called in,” the spy replied. “You’re partner’s in worse shape, I take it?”

“Prowl’s run his processor raw, along with bein’ blinded ‘n banged up,’ the Polihexian explained. “Ratchet worried ‘bout his wirin’ ‘n that’s the priority. Comm can wait.”

“That sounds unpleasant,” Mirage said. “It’s lucky you both made it here, considering that, and everything else.”

“We pushed each other,” Jazz replied. “Or we pushed ourselves for each other. He got hurt protectin’ me ‘cause he didn’t like the odds of us survivin’ if I was the one that caught a face full of Vosian EMP grenade.”

“He’s probably right,” the Towers mech considered the idea. “You know those tunnels in a way that no other mech alive does. You couldn’t have directed him through them blind.”

“Blind, ‘n deaf, ‘n no comms,” the saboteur corrected. “I’da been more helpless than a ‘cycle’s old newlin’. His audials were protected. Don’t know if he woulda even been blinded if we’d had the bad luck of a bomb hittin’ when he was fightin’ for the grenade... I had Scrounge... Frag but I lost him.”

“Lucky for you, and I suppose him, I found the minibot,” Mirage revealed. “And delivered him to the Autobots, and my intelligence to Hound. I think you other agent may have gotten free of the mnemosurgeon. Well, take a look at this.”

“Fraggin’ Pit,” Jazz swore as he watched the communicube play. “Tread Bolt’s a master at Metallikato, ‘cept he uses his claws more than knives. This is his work... worse I’ve seen from him.”

“They fragged up the mneomosurgery,” the spy said. 

“Yah, don’t think it means he’s still mine,” the Polihexian replied. “Mighta just made him a straight up killin’ machine.”

“I lean towards the same conclusion,” Mirage agreed. “Did the medic say how long the repairs would take?”

“Not sure, couple of ‘cycles,” Jazz said. “Don’t wanna rush’m with Prowl. He ain’t gonna be rushed whatever I say. You worried?”

“There are more ‘Cons running around than I like,” the Towers mech explained. “The Dead End has practically been emptied.”

“Ratchet said his comms ‘n data-net connection are touchy,” The saboteur revealed. “Could be Soundwave.”

“The telepath can’t mess with your comms at this distance, not when they were, I hope?” Mirage asked. 

“We should be good here,” Jazz confirmed. “When they’re operational. Think you can confirm if it’s just Ratchet bein’ slagged with or if it’s all the Dead End?”

“Can do,” the spy replied. “I’ll return in a few joors with the answer, and a plan for our transport.”

“If you see any signs of Soundwave, get your aft back here,” the Polihexian ordered. “Whatever slag Straxus is up to, we ain’t up for shuttin’m down this ‘cycle.”

He did not see Mirage leave, but of course he saw the door open and close. The idea that Soundwave, the mech who had single-handedly brought Special Ops to their knees, deceived them all, deceived Jazz most of all was not something the saboteur took lightly. They had crossed paths since the cassette-carrier’s deception had been revealed, and Jazz’s firewalls had held up against the telepaths probes but the Polihexian had known then as he knew now that sooner or later when faced with Soundwave’s interrogation, any mechanism’s defences would fail, including his own. Jazz had programs, and encryptions set up to protect or destroy the most valuable information he possessed but capture could never be taken lightly, especially now. Who in the frag was supposed to rescue them if Mirage got captured along with him and Prowl? The saboteur let out a long vent. It would be joors before Ratchet finished with Prowl, and joors before he could expect the noblemech to return, all he could do now was sit and wait.

***

Smokescreen hummed to himself as he walked through the courtyard to the Palace turned Autobot HQ. Normally he lived on base, partially to hoard his credits, partially because he did hated living alone. But with Devcon in town, the Autobot barracks were the last place he wanted to bring his younglinghood Amica Endura, instead Smokescreen had opted to split his time between the bounty hunter’s hotel, and his originator’s hab suite. It was a little strange bringing Devcon to the suite, but it was even stranger to know that Smokescreen himself was even welcome, or wanted there. He had seen to the furniture delivery for his originator, seen three berths delivered, and found his own designation written on a note marking which berthroom had been intended for him. The Praxian did not know how to feel, and while he had originally dismissed the apartment building’s proximity to the Academy as a coincidence, Smokescreen was no longer certain that was the case.

For a reason he could not explain, Smokescreen kept the note, with his originator’s careful scrawl, in his subspace. Of course he had always known that his originator had not wanted him, not when Smokescreen had been a newspark leaching of his spark, not when he had emerged, not when he had grown. It really was bizarre to consider that his originator might have really wanted him at the habsuite, though he probably would have had a complaint or two with the idea that Smokescreen had interfaced with Devcon in the berth he had ordered him. Sure, his originator had fought to keep him from his progenitor, from the gangs and the trouble Smokescreen had always run to, but the young Praxian had always thought that this was for the sake of his originator’s own reputation, not for his sake. And yet...

“I want to be proud of you, but first you must do something for which I can be proud.”

The glyphs still stung, though Smokescreen could not really fault the sentiment. They had circled in and out of his helm over the stellar-cycles he had lived in Iacon, estranged from originator and brother because he had wanted to be estranged, not because his originator had cut him off. Smokescreen had to admit that his studies, his enlistment with the Autobots, both had been at least partially motivated by the cloying need to hear his originator say he was proud, even when the rookie had kept his comms muted to his originator, he had been motivated by the prospect of those glyphs. Smokescreen had resented the feeling, and still resented it, and he had him lashed out against it, and at any authority figure that tried to put him in his proper place, seeing and hearing his originator in their glyphs and faceplates. 

Was his originator proud of him? Did that matter at this stage? It mattered a little, Smokescreen had to admit, but it really matter more to think that his originator had thought to keep a room for him, a berth with bedding in his favourite colour. The realization that his originator knew the exact shade of blue, and had found a berthcover in it, well it made Smokescreen wonder how much he himself had actually missed when he had been growing up, and how little credit he had actually given his originator. Not that knowing Smokescreen’s favourite colour made up for his originator’s failings, but it softened some of the edges, softened the young Praxian’s spark a bit. So he kept the note, and recharged, and interfaced in that berth, the cover the exact shade of Devcon’s paint.

He was happy, really happy, and it was funny because Smokescreen had always considered himself a generally happy mech, but he had to consider now how much of that had been a self-serving lie. Devcon made him happy, having a place in his originator’s home made him happy, even through the stress and worry of not knowing where his mentor and his originator were. Through his spark he knew his originator was alive, though maybe even farther away now. Hound had not said where he though Jazz was going to meet the evac, just that the mech in question had been his heres-frame. Smokescreen tried not to be prejudiced against the Towers mech he had never met, but it was hard to imagine a mech who had kept an indentured servant could really be all that good, even if he had eventually let Hound go. A sharp noise distracted the Praxian from his musings, and Smokescreen took out his data-net tablet just as arrived at the door to Ops. A message alert blinked on the screen.

“Good ‘cycle Hound,” Smokescreen said. He stepped into the office as he read the message from Devcon. His spark sank a little as he read the bounty hunter’s goodbye. Dev would be back in a few ‘cycles but... Smokescreen looked up. Terror froze his peds, and he dropped the tablet. It was not Hound sitting at Jazz’s desk.

“Jazz needs to work on your training,” the Seeker sneered. There was an insane glint in his optics, and Smokescreen took a step back. A nanoklik later, the Seeker’s servo was around his throat, sharp claws digging into neck, nicking an energon line and making him bleed. 

“Tread Bolt,” the Praxian wheezed. 

“Jazz is going to pay for what he did to me,” the crazed Seeker hissed, digging his claws in just a little deeper. 

“Jazz is...” Smokescreen tried to speak but the pressure on his throat was too strong. His secondary intakes flared open.

“Call your master in, rookie,” Tread Bolt ordered. “And maybe I’ll let you live.”

“Jazz...” the rookie tried again, only to be choked off as the brainwashed ops mech tightened his grip.

“Call. Jazz. In,” the operative snarled. “Or I crush your throat.”

-“Hound!” 

***

One of these mega-cycles the new originator was going to trust a friend to watched Silverbolt for a few joors, but Hound was not ready just yet. He knew that he was more broody than most originators, but not many originators had been forced to escape a tower with kilometres tall, with no ground level entrance when their creation was only joors old. Most had not had to flee their creation’s progenitors, and most did not still have cause to fear if those mechs would one mega-cycle come for that precious creation. Hound could not deny that he held his bitlet more than he let Silverbolt sleep in the containment berth, he would not bother to try. The longer he was home in Iacon, safe amongst the Autobots, the less on edge he would feel, in time he would relax. As it was he thought he would feel a lot better when Jazz and Prowl were back in Iacon, wen the question of Tread Bolt was resolved. A long suffering sigh escaped his vents, and he palmed the door to Jazz’s office. 

-“Hound!” He heard terror in Smokescreen’s comm voice. If he had received the comm a nanoklik earlier, the door still would have been shut, but instead it slid open.

“Hound?” Tread Bolt said, obviously surprised. He would have had no way of knowing that the servus-frame had returned to Iacon. Hound warred with himself, even as he stepped back. His creation was magnetized to his chassis, and he had to protect Silverbolt, but abandoning Smokescreen was a hideous prospet. The Seeker snarled. “Step back through that door, and I tear out the rookie’s throat.”

The decision was made, one that was likely to weigh on his processor, but Hound stepped into the office without any further hesitation. With a voiceless command he trigger the base’s highest security alert. Red Alert would be one the cameras immediately, dispatching the Primal Vanguards, and securing the Prime, all without a single audible alarm. He would not be able to see inside Jazz’s office of course, the Head Op did not allow his team to be recorded, but the Security Chief would have a good idea where the threat was located. The Vanguard would be blocking the escapes in a matter of kliks. So long as they did not try and storm the office, Hound thought they might all survive this mess.

“Tread Bolt,” Hound spoke in his most soothing voice. “You’re damaged, you need to see a medic.”

“Where’s Jazz?” Tread Bolt demanded, shaking Smokescreen as he lifted the young Praxian off the ground. “Do you want me to snap his neck?”

“Jazz isn’t here, Tread Bolt,” the servus-frame said, in the same soothing tones. “He’s on an operation.”

“No!” The Seeker snarled, and his optics glowed even brighter. “Where is Jazz!?”

“Not here,” Hound repeated. “He’s out of Iacon. I’m Chief of Ops at the moment.”

“You?” Tread Bolt’s laugh was cut off. He stared at Hound, stared and Silver Bolt, and the originator immediately moved his servos to guard his creation. “You... you are a housemech for a trine... for the trine... Why is that newling out of the Aerie?”

“He’s my bitlet,” the originator said, tone still soothing, despite the urge to snarl threats at the Seeker. “He’s going to be Seekerkin, not Seeker. His progenitor’s didn’t want him.”

Confusion warped the Autobot Seeker’s faceplates and his grip loosened on Smokescreen, and the rookie took a ragged vent. It was not unheard of for a Seeker to dismiss a grounder creation as unworthy, it was not even unheard of for a Seeker to see a Seekerkin as less, but overall bitlets were cherished by Seekers, zealously guarded by their procreators. Tread Bolt’s natural opinion of the Seeker prince and his mate were less than positive, and it seemed as though mnemosurgery had not completely altered that, and eventually Tread Bolt sneered.

“Useless,” he said. Hound’s plating flared. The statement could have been directed at Thundercracker and Skywarp, or it could have been directed and Silverbolt. It did not really matter, as long as Tread Bolt had his attention on Silverbolt, the originator had every reason to fear.

“I can take you to Jazz,” Smokescreen interjected. Hound and Tread Bolt both turned their helms to stare at him, Hound with an expression of horror, Tread Bolt one with crazed focus. The rookie looked directly at the servus-frame as he spoke. “I know where he is. He has my origin... He... He... I can find him...”

“Take me to him,” Tread Bolt ordered, dropping the Praxian to the floor.

“I will! I will!” The rookie promised. “Just don’t hurt my origin... I just want him back from Jazz... Please!”

“Did he take your originator for his berthwarmer?” The Seeker asked. Smokescreen nodded violently, and with desperate optics pleaded with the crazy operative as Hound watched with horrified understanding.

“You know your origin wants to be with him,” Hound said, playing along with the Praxian’s deception.

“No! Jazz brainwashed him!” Smokescreen replied. “He would never slum it willingly.”

“It sounds like I came just in time,” Tread Bolt sneered. “The Command Trine won’t be happy if I kill their broodcarrier. Rookie, put him in cuffs, and jam his comms.

“Yes, sir!” The Praxian exclaimed. He stumbled over to Hound, vents wheezing and took stasis cuffs from Hound’s own subspace. Partially hidden from Tread Bolt’s view, he adjusted the cuffs, weakening their charge. The servus-frame pretended to be completely immobile as Smokescreen slapped a weak neuro blocker on the back of his helm.

“Jazz will kill you for this, Smokescreen,” the scout warned with a weak voice.

“I will kill Jazz,” the crazed operative countered. “If you work with me Praxian, I just might let you and your origin live to see the next ‘cycle.”

“They’re in Praxus!” Smokescreen lied, very convincingly. If Hound had not known the truth, he would have believed the rookie. 

“Then we’re going south,” Tread Bolt declared. “And you’re going to be my hostage, just in case the Vanguard get any ideas.”

Hound’s spark almost stopped when the brainwashed Seeker pushed Smokescreen out of the room, leaving originator and creation safely behind. Though the neuroblocker was only zapping him intermittently, it still slowed the scout’s movements enough that it took him a few kliks to break free of the cuffs, and a few more to break free of the neurblocker. Why Smokescreen had had the half shorted thing, Hound could not know but he was grateful the rookie had thought to use it. He released a slow vent and dragged himself up as he shook off the last of the neuroblocker’s effects. Smokescreen was leading Tread Bolt away to protect him and Silverbolt, at risk to his own life. There was no way Hound was going to leave him alone with the demented Seeker. 

-“Red, do you have him?” Hound asked when his comm’s blinked back on.

-“Is your rookie a hostage or an ally,” Red Alert demanded. The servus-frame flashed his optics in exasperation. Leave it to the paranoid security mech to even ask that.

-“Hostage,” the scout replied. “He’s leading Tread Bolt south. Tell the Vanguard not to engage, but not to let him leave the dome either. Tread Bolt’s more than half-way insane, there’s no telling what he’ll do to Smokescreen if they move on him.”

-“You’d better find a way to stop him before he reached the guard post,” the security chief warned. “They can hardly stop him from leaving without engaging him.

-“I know,” Hound said. “Where’s Prime?”

-“The War Room,” Red Alert revealed. “Primal Vanguards are guarding him.”

-“Tell him I’m coming,” the servus-frame replied. “I’ll be there in a klik.”

Red Alert did not ask what Hound was thinking, and he probably would not care. He would be focused back on his cameras, watching the Seeker and Praxian hurry across the training fields, already emptied when the first alert had been raised. So long as no one tried to play hero before Hound could arrive, the servus-frame could save Smokescreen, he had to save him. He pushed all thoughts of doubt aside and ran. Silverbolt, who had been sleeping through the entire confrontation took the opportunity to wake up with a squawk. For the first time, the originator did not stop to sooth him. It was distressing, listening to Silverbolt fuss, but a few tears would not harm the bitlet, and Smokescreen was running perilously low on time. Having been warned of his upcoming arrival, the Primal Vanguards guarding the War Room did not try and stop the scout on his arrival, they stepped away from the door, and Hound ran inside.

“Red Alert said Tread Bolt as taken Smokescreen hostage,” Optimus said as Hound stopped in front of him. The servus-frame nodded quickly. 

“Smokescreen tricked him, got him away from me and Silverbolt,” he explained. As he did, he demagnetized his fussy creation and pushed him into the much larger mech’s arms. “Watch my bitlet, please? I need to save Smokescreen!”

“I will,” the Prime agreed, and he cradled the tiny mechling with more gentleness than a mech his size should have possessed. “If you must use lethal force, do so. We can’t have Tread Bolt running free as he is. We’ve received notice that he killed the innkeeper in the dark-cycle at a small motel to the east.”

“I’ll do whatever I have to,” Hound promised. “Keep everyone out of my way! I don’t want any Vanguards spooking him and killing my mech!”

They would have to cross past the armoury, past the range. Hound transformed as his peds hit the stairs to the courtyard. As a Seeker, Tread Bolt had always flown from place to place, especially when he had been in a hurry. He had never had any reason to learn the short cuts grounders depended on. There was no way he could fly while pushing Smokescreen along, so they would have to be on ped, and the rookie was unlikely to be leading him on any strange paths. No, they would be taking the most open, direct route to the southern exit. If Hound was fast enough, he would be able to cut them off before they hit the armoury. No, not if he was fast enough, there could be no ifs, Hound had to be fast enough.


	24. Chapter 24

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Do not expect an update next week, if I have a chance to get one ready, great but I realized I have a bit of a major project next weekend, new bed, woo, so I'll probably be cleaning and trying to decipher Ikea instructions, rather than writing. After that though things ought to return to normal.

Smokescreen’s spark pulsed erratically in its chamber. He was terrified, absolutely terrified, and it was a desperate struggle not to fall apart. The farther away they got from the Palace, the more hideously alone the Praxian felt. It had been the correct decision, of course it had been, but Smokescreen wished rather uselessly that he had thought his plan through a little bit further before he had attack. His plan had only been to get Tread Bolt far away from Hound and the bitlet, and he had not taken even a nanoklik’s time to consider what he would do with the Seeker once he had lured him out. Hindsight was the Pit, and the young mech could only wish he had actually tried to learn Diffusion, or Circuit-Su or something, rather than just that street slag from Barricade. It might have served him well enough up until now, but against a seasoned fighter Smokescreen knew he was as good as scrap.

 

He needed to get a little distance between him and Tread Bolt, enough space to transform, but the Seeker kept his claws dug into the back of Smokescreen’s neck and the rookie op knew if he moved even a centimetre out of line, he was dead. So he walked, and he prayed someone was coming to help. The neurodampener he had put on Hound was glitchy, and it would not keep the seasoned op down for long. But Hound was still going to need to get Silverbolt to safety, still need to make a plan of is own, and all of that took time, time Smokescreen was not confident he had. As fear threatened to take him under, the Praxian willed himself to think like his originator, to keep his helm focused on what was in front of him, not on the terror in his spark.

 

There were dozens of faster ways to get to the southern gate, but speed was not what Smokescreen was after, if anything the opposite, so he kept walking, kept leading the Seeker straight. They were off any clear path, instead they were walking across the open fields that usually filled with mechanisms during the mid-cycle break. No one was here now. Smokescreen did not know if this was because Hound had order the grounds cleared, or if it was because the duty shift had only just started. The base felt eerily empty, there was not a mech in sight. The only explanation could have been Hound, of course it had to be Hound. On the one servo, the rookie was glad no one was likely to pop up and spook Tread Bolt, and to get him slagged, but on the other servo it was incredibly disheartening to be alone, no sign of rescue to be found.

 

His originator would have given him a sign. He would have wanted Smokescreen to know, to prepare so that he did not complicate his own rescue, but origin... his _originator_ was no where near. Unfairly, the Praxian felt betrayed by this, but he crushed the thought. Smokescreen needed to be thinking _like_ his originator, not of him. How could he get Tread Bolt to let go of him without getting himself slagged? The rookie was a seasoned con artist, a seasoned petty thief and he had escaped Enforcers and rival street gangs more times that he ought to have been proud of. Force was not the way to go, but cunning was. Tread Bolt was no half-aft thief or an overclocked Enforcer though, and no operative survived long in the Game if they were not cunning. Tread Bolt had been out on ops for at least half as long as Jazz had, there was no way the Seeker was not a clever mech. What he was now though was fragged in the helm, and just might be enough to give Smokescreen the advantage.

 

The armoury came into view, and an idea popped into the Praxian’s helm. It was probably insane, but Smokescreen was desperate enough to take, and when he took the his next step, he pretended to stumble. Tread Bolt let go, and as the rookie fell, he transformed. Racing off would have been the sane thing to do now, but instead Smokescreen burnt rubber, and drove in quick circles around the Seeker. His mod released a magnetic smog, and it clung to Tread Bolt’s plating. Blinded, and enraged by it, the crazed op leapt into the air, only to have the smog follow him. For a moment, Smokescreen thought he just might be have been safe, and he drove as for the armoury, as fast as his engine could go. Pain erupted as the Seeker crashed into the Praxian’s roof, the heavier mech dug his elbow in in such away that Smokescreen’s t-cog was triggered and he was forced to transform. Though the rookie tried to scramble away from Tread Bolt, as his smog still blinded the madmech, the mech’s servo slashed out from the fog, and caught Smokescreen’s leg.

 

“I don’t have to see you to kill you,” Tread Bolt snarled as his claws cut through the cables leading to Smokescreen’s ankle. The Praxian could not hold back a cry of pain as he desperately tried to break free. It was for not, and the crazed sank the digits of his other servo into the plating of Smokescreen’s upper leg. “I’ll just claw my way up your frame and dig out your spark.”

 

Belatedly, Smokescreen realized he needed a weapon, his standard issue blaster was in his subspace, in reach, and fighting the urge to buckle under pressure and pain, he dug it out, and arms shaking pointed it at Tread Bolt just as the smog faded and the Seeker’s faceplates appeared. The Praxian yelped with surprise and pain as Tread Bolt lashed out, faster than he could ever have prepared for, knocking the blaster out of his servo, and out of his reach. The Seeker straddle the young mech, vents heaving and plating clattering with hysteric anger. He was going to die, Smokescreen realized, there was no way he could throw Tread Bolt off, the older mech was so much more than a match for anything the rookie could offer. He was going to die.

 

“Sky Patrol,” a voice tore the Seeker’s attention away from Smokescreen, and both he and the Praxian looked to where the voice came from. Jazz stood still, visor glinting. “Get off my rookie.”

 

The voice sounded wrong, but Smokescreen was not about to question it. He stayed frozen as the crazed flier’s frame vibrated over his, and the Praxian did not even dare take an intake. Suddenly, Tread Bolt lunged off of him, and towards Jazz, only to crash into the ground. Jazz reappeared metres away, and the Seeker lunged again. In front of Smokescreen’s startled optics, the scene repeated again and again. A mech was kneeling next to him, almost out of nowhere. Hound! Jazz had mentioned that the scout had a unique mod, but he had never gone into any details. Holograms, Hound had Tread Bolt jumping and diving at holograms, leading the Seeker farther and farther away from the crippled young rookie.

 

“Gonna have to do better,” Hound said, in a decent, though nowhere near perfect. mimic of Jazz’s accent.

 

Tread Bolt’s processor was too fried for him to notice the bastardized accent, and he launched into the air, diving at the scout’s hologram only to crash face first into the rough ground. He made an incoherent sound of rage, and spun around in a circle, searching for his target. Hound stared at him, somehow invisible to the Seeker, Smokescreen watched him reach into his subspace, as he shifted his holograms around. Never taking his optics off the dangerous mech, Hound dropped the blaster into the Praxian’s servos. Plating lightly clattering as Smokescreen processed his all too close brush with death, he gripped the blaster, and aimed.

 

Jazz appeared, or a hologram of him did, and another, and another until the Seeker was surrounded. Processor too damaged to compute what he was seeing, Tread Bolt launched into the sky with a glyphless screech. Smokescreen fired, but his shot went wide as the flier enter a death spiral in the air. Tread Bolt pulled out of the dive suddenly, screaming Hound’s designation, and Hound dropped the holograms as he took out another blaster and aimed it high. The Seeker dove, and a bright flash of laser fire came from the right, and Tread Bolt fell from the sky. Hound and Smokescreen both looked in the direction of the shot, and standing there, cygar clenched in his denta, was Kup.

 

“Nice show, Hound,” the ancient sergeant said. “Ya did good, you too rookie.”

 

“Great timing,” Hound replied, leaving Smokescreen’s side, blaster aimed at the Seeker’s spark, as he crossed the short distance to his reprogrammed teammate’s prone frame.

 

“Used an EMP blaster,” Kup explained as the scout made a sound of surprise. “Figured he’s one of us ‘n we need to give him a fair shot.”

 

“You never fail to have the right weapon,” the servus-frame said, he knelt and applied a dampener to the Seeker’s helm. “Let’s hope the medics can do something for Tread Bolt. And you, Smokescreen. Can you stand?”

 

“I can’t feel my ped, so I’m gonna say no,” Smokescreen replied, feeling dazed and numb. “Thanks Hound. I thought I was a dead mech.

 

“I was terrified I wasn’t going to make it in time,” Hound confessed. “That’s a handy mod you have.”

 

“My origin... he bought it for me,” the Praxian revealed. “Don’t know what he was expecting me to pick, or if he didn’t like what I chose, but he let me choose it. It’s funny Hound all the good memories are coming out now, not just the bad. I’ve been watching his place for him, making sure the furniture got set up right. And I discovered he had a room for me, not just a guest room, for me. It didn’t occur to me that he’d want me that close.”

 

“I’m glad,” the scout replied. “I really am.”

 

***

 

Though Prowl’s processor was not quite as much of a mess as he had feared, Ratchet still grumbled and cursed as he soldered fresh wires into place, already having tossed the shorted ones onto the table beside him. The last medic that had run maintenance on the Praxian had used copper wires instead of gold, probably without questioning his patient, though it was entirely possible Prowl would not know why he needed gold wires, not copper, at least in his processor. Gold stood up to the intense wear the tactician put himself through, and produced the least heat. Overheating was a serious factor, considering Prowl’s glitch. Ratchet had already reinforced a pinched coolant line near the Praxian’s tactical set up. The bulk of the shorted wires were around the Praxian’s emotional cortex, two thick masses that coiled around the mnemosurgery scar left from when some hack had taken needles to a sparkling and hacked apart connections.

 

Prowl’s processor had repaired itself as best as it could, better Ratchet thought than he would have warned any patient to expect. The coil of wires stabilized the post mnemosurgery link between the tactician’s emotional centre and logic computer, just as another coil supported the weak connector at the root of the flaw. This scarring in the form of excess wiring was what kept Prowl running smooth, kept his glitch from setting off a fatal crash, when one two wires frayed or shorted, there were other’s to keep the electrical connections going until Prowl’s self-repairs could repair or replace them, or until a medic did some maintenance. Not matter what the wires were made of, any installed in Prowl’s processor they would need to be replaced periodically, though not so often as to make the Praxian’s frame upkeep schedule excessive. All Prowl really needed to stave off processor repairs was a regular dose of repair nanites, and the medic made a mental note to write the tactician a prescription.

 

Once Ratchet had his patient’s wiring up to snuff, he turned his attention to Prowl’s visual cortex. He removed it from the Praxian’s processor and turned it over in his tired old servos. It did not take long for him to conclude that it was well and truly fried. Even if Ratchet spent an orn on it, he did not think he would ever trust it enough to install it in Prowl’s helm. It could power on, and did automatically as long as Prowl was online, but it could not process visual data, all it was not was a heatsync. Frowning, the medic turned the damaged component over again, and curse in several dialect of Neocybex and Primal Venacular. There were several different styles of visual cortex, and it was the Praxian’s and Ratchet’s misfortune that Prowl’s style of visual cortex was not one the medic kept stocked. Ratchet looked back to the fried component, and the knowledge that he had no replacement for it still did not change his conclusion that the part was scrap.

 

Reinstalling it would do Prowl no good. Keeping his optics lit was hardly beneficial, and leaving a fried component in his helm would actually leave him vulnerable to a short, which could only leave leave him at risk of processor damage. So instead, Ratchet tossed the part into his scrap bin, and turned his attention to the Praxian’s comm setup. The medic gave a low hum of approval as he accessed this set of components. Though damaged by the EMP, they had not been destroyed, and it was only a matter of replacing sensors and wires to get Prowl’s comms back in working order. Unlike Jazz, the tactician had a standard comm set up, which made it repairs to it, and the replacement parts required to perform the repairs standard as well. Ratchet grabbed what he needed from his neatly organized storage unit, and set to work.

 

Several joors after he started, the medic leaned back on his stool and massaged his servos. In order to give the repairs time to integrate, Ratchet left Prowl in a low level of medical stasis. Standing, with a creak from his knees, the medic left the surgery suite, grabbed a couple of cubes and plodded his way to the treatment room where Jazz was waiting. Unsurprisingly, the Polihexian was up and waiting for him. Ratchet handed Jazz one of the cubes and leaned back on one of the treatments berth. Everyone of his struts ached, and the old mech reminded himself that he needed to be paying more attention to his own self-repair systems.

 

“He okay?” the waiting mech asked. “Didn’t take as long as I’d thought it would.”

 

“I don’t have a replacement for his visual cortex,” Ratchet said, absentmindedly rubbing his sore servos together. “And it’s too slagged to repair so I removed it. Some medic in Iacon will half to finish his repairs. I took care of everything else. His processor has more secondary wiring than normal, more than he would have emerged with. It looks like his self-repair system made him a bit of a scaffold around his mnemosurgery scar, as well as his glitch. It’s probably what’s kept him functioning despite the damage he suffered.”

 

“You outta come with us ‘n finish his repairs yourself,” Jazz replied. Ratchet scowled at him. “You are probably the first medic to take good care o’ him, Ratch.”

 

“Don’t you guilt me, mechling,” the medic warned. “I told you I’m not going anywhere.”

 

“I don’t want to have to come lookin’ for your scraps,” the Polihexian said. “You’re headed that way ‘n you know it. You’re a creaking mess, probably don’t wanna use any of your med grade hoard on yourself ‘cause you know you can’t replace it. If you got patients you think you can save, why not take them outta here?”

 

“I can’t!” Ratchet snapped, and his helm dropped. “I haven’t had anyone come to the clinic in quartexes. They hide from me when I go looking for them... Conscription’s been a thing here for a while, you know. Straxus’ made it mandatory... I tried hiding patients here for a while, but being trapped in the clinic, no one stayed that long. Most of the ones treated, I hid, are just... gone.”

 

“Ratch, mech ‘m srry,” Jazz replied. “I really am, but I don’t wanna see you martyr yourself.”

 

“You’re such a pain in the aft, you know that?” The old mech grumbled. “Joors are wasting, I should get started on your comms.”

 

“I think we’re better off waitin’ for next ‘cycle,” the saboteur said. “You need a break. A cube of med grade, ‘n some real ‘charge.”

 

“You giving me medical advice?” Ratchet asked, with scowl.

 

“They say medics make the worst patients,” Jazz replied. At least of himself, Ratchet knew it was true. He stretched, felt his joint groan and pop. Maybe a cube of med grade would not be such a bad idea. A good recharge, though was an idle fantasy.

 

“Fine,” the medic relented. “Prowl’ll be coming out of stasis soon. I’ll hit my berth when he’s settled.”

 

“So ya might as well get that med grade now,” the Polihexian suggested.

 

“Still think you’re my origin?” Ratchet grumbled, but pushed off the berth.

 

He was still grumbling when he stepped from the treatment room and crossed in front of his reception desk, unstaffed now for a vorn. The chime of his door rang as it slid open, and a familiar frame entered the doorway. Ratchet’s spark almost extinguished as Drift walked into the clinic. Once the speedster had had blue optics and almost completely white paint. His optics were red now, and his limbs painted black. Any hope that Ratchet might have had that Drift would comeback, come to his senses died as the much younger mech looked around the lobby with an expression of irritation. The hopeless Syk addict was gone, in his place was a hard sparked Decepticon. It was not the change the medic had dreamed of for the youngster.

 

“Hello, Drift,” Ratchet said. He knew Jazz was only steps away, in the treatment room, certainly listening, almost certainly armed. Ratchet also knew that the saboteur had dotted the clinic with traps and tricks, If the speedster made a wrong move, Jazz would put him down. Ratchet did not think his spark could take it, so he stood there, blocking the line of sight of the treatment room, not to protect Jazz, but Drift.

 

“Deadlock,” the ‘Con corrected. “I’m here to search the clinic. Rumour is your hiding Empties from the conscription squads.”

 

“How can I hide anyone that doesn’t exist, Drift?” The medic asked, tiredly. “Turmoil’s squads have cleared the Dead End.”

 

“Dead. Lock,” the young mech repeated through clenched fangs. “Think I’m gonna take your glyph for it?”

 

“Try and rough handle me and see how far you get, youngling,” Ratchet warned, and he flared his plating as he towered over the smaller mech. “Get out of my clinic, Deadlock.”

 

“I was doing you a favour, Ratchet, coming here alone,” Deadlock said, optics glinting dangerous, and his voice rough and cruel. “I’ll be back, with Turmoil and the squad. We’ll see what you say then.”

 

Deadlock turned on his heel and left the clinic, the chimes of the door ringing a final time. Ratchet buried his faceplates in his servos. Behind him, he heard a door slide open, and soft ped steps. Jazz was beside him nanoklik later, and he placed a servo on the medic’s shoulder, Ratchet hardly noticed it. He had pulled Drift back from the brink of death, detoxed him, and fixed his frame, but he had not been able to fix the street mech’s batter spirit, and now Drift, or Deadlock as Megatron had re-designated him, was a ‘Con, a ‘Con preying on the very group of mechanisms he had once been a part of. The mechling had been Ratchet’s last reason to remain in Polihex, the last hope the medic had had to cling to, but Deadlock had crushed the hope to dust.

 

“Do we got company?” Jazz asked. Ratchet looked up, expecting to see Prowl, but it was not a Praxian standing off to the side of the window, blaster in hand, but a different mech, a slender, angular blue and white Towers mech.

 

“Who the frag are you?” Ratchet demanded. The mech raised a browridge at him, and looked at Jazz.

 

“This is Mirage,” the saboteur said, gently. “Ratchet. A friend, my evac in fact.”

 

“Have you been skulking around my clinic?” The medic asked, furious at the sight of the mech. “I sure as frag didn’t let you in.”

 

“I don’t skulk,” Mirage replied, primly. “I didn’t need you to let me in.”

 

“Just leave it Ratch,” Jazz said, and he turned to the newcomer. “Ain’t gonna see ‘Raj if he don’t want you to. So, what’s the glyph about the ‘net, ‘n comms?”

 

“It’s worse the closer you get to Darkmount,” the Towers mech revealed. “No signal at all just a few blocks out of the Dead End, not unlike Kaon.”

 

“Definitely turnin’ Polihex into a major base then,” the Polihexian concluded. “Ya got transport sorted?”

 

“A squad leader accidently got overcharged,” Mirage explained. “I relieved him of his shuttle, and left him to sleep it off.”

 

“So we don’t got a lotta time,” Jazz said.

 

“He is _very_ overcharged,” the spy emphasized. “As is his squadron. But we should be in the air before the light-cycle. The clamp down on comms extends to the skies. Air control won’t immediately question our lack of communication.”

 

“I like it, where’d ya park it?” The saboteur asked.

 

“In the crater a few blocks away,” Mirage said. “I think it used to be a school.”

 

“I know the spot, “Jazz replied. “Facade’s still up so no one’s gonna notice it.”

 

“Why do I get the feeling you want to leave now,” Ratchet interjected, bristling as the mechs spoke as if he was not there. It was foolish to be angry, and this Mirage had done nothing to earn it but, he reminded of everything the medic had tried to fight.

 

“The second Deadlock reports to Turmoil, they’ll be on their way here,” the Polihexian said. “We go now, or we get ready for a fire fight...”

 

“We go then,” the medic agreed, with a long vent of regret.

 

“We?” Jazz asked.

 

“We,” Ratchet confirmed.

 

“Thank Primus,” the saboteur sighed, and his shoulders sagged. “Thought I was gonna have to drug you, ‘n I didn’t like my chances. If I asked Mirage for help, I’d owe’m another favour in I think my tab’s gettin’ pricey.”

 

“If I was a bank, I would not be extending you further credit,” Mirage replied. “Is everyone ambulatory?”

 

“I can have Prowl up in a klik,” the old mech said. A part of him wanted to fight, if only to die in his clinic, to not have to live with yet another failure, but then the ‘Cons would win, so out of spite he straightened his back.

 

“Do it Ratchet,” Jazz ordered. “As soon as he’s up, we’re movin’.”

 

***

 

Prowl onlined to darkness, it only took a quick looked at his log to see his visual cortex had been disabled or removed. Despite having onlined  blind for the last couple of mega-cycles, the effect was still unnerving. On the other servo, this time as he noted, he was free of pain, and that was enough of an improvement to have him feeling a considerable amount of gratitude. He felt the medic’s field before either mech could speak, and the Praxian adjusted the ATS power input to high. Fear,  anger, and  sadness, something had happened, Prowl did not yet know what, but whatever it  had , he needed to be combat ready, so far as a blind mech could be.

 

“I can’t replace your visual cortex,” Ratchet said, sounding drained. “It’s just rare enough that I don’t have a replacement part... We’re heading to Iacon. Looks like ‘Cons are coming for me.”

 

“Jazz has made contact with the evac?” Prowl asked. It would have been a sparkrending decision to abandoned his practice, but the Praxian was pleased Ratchet had had the sense to do so.

 

“Evac’s here,” the medic replied. “Towers mech, how the frag Jazz met him... I know where that mechling came from.”

 

“They share functions,” the tactician said as he sat up carefully. The feedback from his doorwings was still muted, making him doubly blind. Though he could still move them, and use them for balance, they felt more like phantom limbs than actual appendages. “I believe they met at work, as it were.”

 

“Hmmf,” Ratchet made a disdainful sound.

 

“You’re disconcerted by this mech,” Prowl observed.

 

“I was a Senator, once upon a time,” the old mech explained. “It wasn’t like it is now, it wasn’t equal representation. There were a lot more Senators either representing the Crystal City, or other states where they “resided”. They made it impossible to do anything to improve the conditions of the cold-constructs and labourers. Eventually there was an election and one of their ilk got my seat. For all I know he won it fair, by the point I didn’t care. I went back to medicine, went here where at least I could see through my own optics that I was making a difference.”

 

“Our evac got his servus-frame to Iacon when the mech in question was tired of his life in the Crystal City,” the Praxian revealed what little he knew of the spy Jazz had called Mirage. “I believe his principles are likely considerably different from those of the Golden Age senators.”

 

“I don’t like that I need to be reminded,” Ratchet said with a long vent. “Let’s get going. Your doorwing sensors are still too hot to use. I’ll help you along.”

 

It was not what he wanted to hear.  If the Decepticons were coming, how exactly was Prowl supposed to fight  if he was completely blind? He let the medic lead him from the treatment room as he left his  tactical systems to analyze  Ratchet’s medical block on his sensory relay. The analysis was complete as the older mech led him over to Jazz who was speaking to the evac. Mirage had a cultured accent to suit his frametype. No mechanism would see a Towers mech and automatically conclude he was a spy, really it was perhaps the best disguise Prowl could think of. As Jazz spoke  on, the tactician’s battle computer  was working quickly to formulae an attack  to take out the block that kept his doorwings blind.

 

“Mirage, this is Prowl,” the Polihexian introduced the mechs.

 

“You helped Hound,” the Towers mech said. “I owe you.”

 

“It did not strike me as a significant gesture,” Prowl replied. “I seem to have been mistaken.”

 

“Don’t pass up a debt from ‘Raj, Prowl,” Jazz warned. “He likes to collect them, not dish him out.”

 

“And you owe me the most,” Mirage said. “Hound is a brother to me, Prowl. I didn’t want to leave him in Praxus, but the Spymaster takes a particularly dim view of him due to his defection. Ignoring orders in favour of guarding him would likely have ended badly.”

 

“I am glad I could be of service,” the Praxian replied. He did not think he had any use of any debts or favours but it intrigued him that Jazz described this mech as collecting them.

 

“Well, do you want me to scout a route or will you be crawling through filth?” The spy asked, obviously of Jazz. The last glyph was spoken with considerable disdain. Primus, Prowl hoped Jazz did not plan on reentering the sewers.

 

“We’ll follow you,” the saboteur said. “You still got your blaster, right, Ratch?”

 

“I have it,” Ratchet confirmed. Prowl felt the larger mech shift as he no doubt pulled the blaster in question from his subspace. The tactician made no attempted to reach for his rifle, he would be more likely to hit one of his allies than an enemy.

 

“We go out the back,” Jazz ordered the evac. “Some of us still gotta worry ‘bout bein’ seen.”

 

The second statement intrigued the Praxian. Ratchet guided Prowl as they set out, plating and EM field tight to his protoform. It was difficult for the mech to make this decision, to abandon his clinic, and end his self-imposed exile. Prowl did not attempt to comfort him, he though Ratchet would not be altogether welcome to it, certainly not in public, and there was nothing that the tactician could think to say in any case.  So he remained silent as Ratchet led him out the back door and into the alley. Every mech,  Prowl included, vented a relieved sigh when no Decepticons appeared to challenge them. 

 

“Go ahead, ‘Raj,” Jazz said.

 

“What the frag?” Ratchet cursed, and Prowl flared his doorwing’s, battle protocols came online. “Where’d he go?”

 

“I’m here,” Mirage replied. “You just can’t see me.”

 

“It’s a mod, Ratch,” the Polihexian explained. “One of a kind.”

 

A mod that could make a mech invisible, Prowl had never heard of such a thing, never imagined it. It made sense that such a unique modification would have been created in the Builders’ city-state. There could be no more ideal mod for a spy. The Praxian wondered why there was not an army of Towers spies with such modifications, it struck him as unlikely that Mirage was the only Towers mech that served as a spy.  But Jazz had said it was unique, and that statement intrigued the tactician. If Mirage had lied to the Polihexian about it, would Hound, a mech who would almost certainly know the truth, reveal that truth to Jazz? Or would his loyalty remain to his former heres? 

 

Prowl would consider the question later, for the time being, thinking of every step  before he made it took his concentration, as galling as that was. So he focused on his steps, as Ratchet whispered him warning of debris, and other hazards. It was not as quick a walk as the Praxian might have liked and he thought it was no doubt his blindness that was slowing them down,  but there was nothing he could do for it. Though he had been a nanolik from attacking the block, he had held off  knowing full well Ratchet would give him no end of grief for it when he discovered what Prowl had done , and so  the tactician remained totally blinded. He was anxious, Prowl realized, even under the wait of the ATS, his emotional cortex’s output was strong enough that  he actually felt it. Every sound made his plating prickle, as he listened for danger.  It was deeply unpleasant.

 

“We’re clear,” Mirage declared. Jazz whistled.

 

“Nice,” Jazz said. “Decepticon crew transport. No one’s gonna think twice about it ‘til we get to Iacon.”

 

“I leave it to you to ensure we don’t get shot down over Autobot space,” the spy replied. 

 

“Not a problem,” the Polihexian assured him. He stood next to Prowl, his field brushing against the tactician’s. “Looks like we made it, Prowl.”

 

“You have a gift for defying the odds,” Prowl replied.

 

E nd Chapter 24


	25. Chapter 25

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's finally updated! The end is near. Stay tuned for Barricade will be returning in the next chapter.

 

Though the Decepticon transport could be flown with only one mech, Jazz sat himself in the chair next to Mirage. The Polihexian looked over the controls, familiarizing himself with them as Mirage initiated lift off and smoothly piloted the craft up into the sky. In all the vorns Jazz had known the other mech, he had see Mirage pilot dozens of transports, and small pleasure crafts from almost every city-state on Cybertron, with one notable exception. He had never seen the Towers mech fly a craft built in the Crystal City. Jazz was comfortable piloting most crafts himself, but his flight joors were considerably fewer than Mirage, and the range of craft he had even flown on as a passenger were fewer still. There was no doubt in his processor that the spyould fly this ‘Con transport with his optics offline, not that he was planning on challenging Mirage to do so.

 

“Do you even go your own craft?” Jazz asked, as he casually took a remote from his subspace and pressed a button, before turning his attention back to the skies. Straxus and the ‘Cons were not going to benefit from Ratchet’s abandoned supplies or tools.

 

“I don’t,” Mirage confirmed the Polihexian’s suspicions. “I am not home enough to make use of a pleasure craft, and I don’t want to worry about hiding a craft during an op anymore than you do.”

 

“’Cept I got back up to call in,” the sabtoeur said, looking away from the sky to watch Mirage’s profile. “What’re you gonna do if you get over your helm?”

 

“Call you, of course,” the Towers mech replied, as though the answer was obvious. “I have a considerably long list of debts to call in.”

 

“You wouldn’t need to call one in to get me to come,” Jazz promised. “You’re my friend, ‘Raj, I’ll always have your back.”

 

“Same,” Mirage said. “But I will continue collecting your debts.”

 

“I know you will,” the Polihexian chuckled. “So what’ our flight plan? ‘M thinkin’ ya don’t plan on flyin’ o’er Rodion or Kalis.”

 

“We’ll be skirting the very edge of Crystal City airspace, and the Manganese Mountains before circling to Iacon,” the spy explained. “We shouldn’t have any trouble. I’ve sent my call sign to the guardian.”

 

“I like you’re plan,” Jazz said. “Ain’t you worried he’ll call Arcee?”

 

“Omega Supreme doesn’t answer to her,” Mirage replied. “He doesn’t even answer to the Crystal Lord. He’s protected the Crystal City since before written records, and it’s all he cares to do.”

 

“Bet she don’t like that,” the saboteur thought out loud.

 

“Not really,” it was the Tower mech that chuckled now. “But he’s untouchable, there’s nothing she can do about him.”

 

“Makes me which there were more guardians left,” Jazz said. Below them, the sparkling towers came into view, looking like not much more than jewels from this altitude.

 

“Most of them were puppets,” Mirage replied. “Which is why Omega Supreme is the last known Omega Sentinel alive. That is his view, in any case. He refused to be used a weapon of death.”

 

“Zeta Prime abused their power, that’s for sure,” the Polihexian agreed. “He’s gotta be Crystal City’s best defence.”

 

“At the very least he seems to work as a deterrent,” the spy said. “I can’t think of a time when he’s really been tested.”

 

Mirage did not want to work as a weapon of death either. The respect and camaraderie Jazz thought his friend felt for the sentinel. This was probably as much the source of the Towers mech’s determination to remain Neutral as anything else. His ability meant that he could have been the perfect assassin, in fact any Fellowship member would have killed to have Mirage’s electro disruptor, and they would have shamelessly exploited the tool. Who was to say it would not have gone to their helms? And who could have stopped them if it had. No, Jazz was glad that such a dangerous mod was in the possession of a mech who had enough moral compunctions as to not abuse it. That did not change the fact that Jazz wanted Mirage in his ops, in the Autobots. Though the Polihexian knew he himself would never try to abuse the spy or his abilities, there were commanders in the Autobot army that would have felt entitled too. Mirage’s disinclination towards enlisting was definitely not without justification, not that he needed to justify himself to Jazz or anyone else. Even if Jazz knew he would be more respectful of Mirage’s wishes than the spy’s progenitor/spymaster, but he had to respect the mech’s decision. Just like he had planned to with Ratchet, had the stubborn fragger refused to leave the clinic, he had a plan for saving the Towers mech from himself should Arcee step over the line.

 

“Think you’ll stick ‘round Iacon long enough for that drink I owe you?” Jazz asked after a period of companionable silence.

 

“Long enough for that,” Mirage agreed, and then he sighed. He looked, Jazz thought more than a bit tired. “A ‘cycle at most. We both have questions about Darkmount, and I know full well when I tell the Spymaster I’ll be assigned the operation. As much as I’d like even an orn at home, I do want to see what’s going on in Polihex. I’ll keep you in the loop.”

 

“You call me if you need evac,” the saboteur ordered. “No Towers mech’s gonna be able to slip ‘round Polihex like me.”

 

“With any luck it won’t come to that,” the noblemech replied. “But I know who I’ll call.”

 

To date, Mirage had never called Jazz for help, apart from when Hound had defected to the Autobots, and the Polihexian did not count that considering he had already consider the servus-frame a friend by that point. Even after he had been without his partner, Mirage had always managed to get himself out of whatever trouble he might have found, but then the whole invisible thing was a particularly powerful advantage in their line of work. Still, sooner or later the Towers mech was bound to run into something he could not get out of alone, and when that happen, Jazz had to hope he was close enough to help, and that Mirage would not be so prideful that he would not call for it at all.

 

When the sparkling Towers were behind them, and the Manganese mountains rose up to their left, Jazz relaxed a little further. No Decepticons had come to engage them, neither had any Crystal City defenders. With a soft vent of relief, he plugged into the craft’s comms, and tuned them to Iacon’s frequency. It took some fiddling but as they began to skirt the mountain chain, he heard a crackle, singling that they had come into comm range. Tapping in a code, Jazz initiated their stolen craft’s comms and pinged Iacon. Though the ping would be heard by any communication’s Bot, the saboteur had encrypted the link so only Iacon’s communications chief could answer it. For a bream, the link was silent, but Jazz did not feel any panic or rush. He knew Blaster could be anywhere, on base or at home, so he sat back and waited. Mirage kept the transport flying in a wide loop, just skirting Autobot airspace when the link crackled, and both Jazz and his noble friend vented with relief.

 

“Blastbox is online, streaming only the grooviest tunes,” Blaster’s voice came over the line. “I know only one mech that’d use that jingle for a code.”

 

“Hey Blaster,” Jazz replied. “No tune’s better than hearin’ a friendly voice. Tell HQ we’re flyin’ in Decepticon colours. It’d be a really slag if we got shot down in friendly space.”

 

“HQ’s in with me,” the cassette-carrier announced. “You’ve got an escort coming in to lead you home.”

 

“What, you think I’d need to stop ‘n ask directions to Iacon?” The saboteur asked with a chortle. He glanced over Mirage.

 

“The Big Bot wants to make sure no one gets spooked by you and makes a mess,” Blaster explained. “I’m directing traffic the whole way. See you on the ground, Jazz.”

 

“Lookin’ forward to it,” Jazz replied. Though he kept the comm opened, Jazz muted it as he turned to Mirage: “Don’t ‘spose you feel too comfortable with that.”

 

“I’d rather not get shot down,” Mirage said, and he glanced at the radar. “Looks like Autobot Seekers.”

 

Sure enough, Jazz saw two such fliers coming to flank their pilfered craft. As they flew into position, the cyberjets dipped their noses, signalling their friendly intentions. The Polihexian had nothing to fear from either Autobot, but Jazz also knew Mirage probably felt differently. He was tense, though that “stiff upper lipplate” all but coded to his frametype meant Mirage hid it well. Still, it was contagious. Silence returned to the cockpit, less companionable than before. As much as he was certain Mirage knew Jazz would never let an Autobot try and seize him, it was natural for the Towers mech to be uneasy. He had come and gone from Iacon for vorns before and after the saboteur had enlisted, but no one had ever been in the position to know, and as surely as the Seekers had seen Jazz in the cockpit, they had seen Mirage.

 

“If you feel better for it, you can take off soon as we’re out,” the Polihexian offered.

 

“The offer is appreciated, but not necessary, Jazz,” the spy replied. “I’m fine. So long as you don’t try and introduce me.”

 

“Nah,” Jazz assured him. “Not unless you ask.”

 

“Thank you,” Mirage said.

 

They descended smoothly over Iacon. Only a bream from landing and suddenly Jazz was exhausted again, both mentally and physically. One half decent recharge had not been enough to make up for the ‘cycles of stress, exertion, and lack of rest. It would be joors yet before he could rest, he had to brief Optimus on Rodion and Polihex, and he had to check in on Scrounge, and his team. As much faith as he had in Hound’s ability to managed operations, it had to have been a bit of a trial for the scout to juggle a newling, and the job. Jazz hoped that Smokescreen had done his part to help his stand in mentor, and not gotten into any mischief that might have given Hound more work. With the serious nature of the operation, Jazz had faith that his rookie had done his part.

 

“Commander Jazz, this is Breakaway from Iacon Air Defence, Windrazor and me will lead you in to land,” the red and purple jet on their left spoke over the comm.

 

“Lead on,” the saboteur replied. He watched the Autobot fliers glide in front of their craft.

 

Mirage gave them generous space, and effortlessly guided the Decepticon transport into land as Windrazor and Breakway landed and then cleared the runway. When the craft came to a stop, and Jazz looked down through the window. He saw that despite the fact it was closer to dark-cycle than light-cycle the airstrip was not empty. It was not just Optimus Prime’s silhouette he saw, but Hound’s, Primal Vanguards, and a paramedical team. True, the Bots had no idea what state the ops team was coming home in, Jazz had intentionally kept comm chat to a minimum in case of Decepticon bugs. Jazz was inordinately pleased that the Vanguard had not just taken for granted that the Jazz was a Bot, and that there might not be trouble coming back with him. Indescribably grateful to be home, Jazz stood from his chair, his frame complaining quite loudly. Sure, it was only his plating but that did not mean the dents and scratches did not hurt like Pit.

 

“I’ll follow you off,” Mirage said, disappearing as he did. “Perhaps we should delay the engex... You look slagged.”

 

“I’m alright,” Jazz replied, with a dismissive way. “I’ll check on my team, get a buffer, ‘n head over to my office.”

 

“You think that medic is going to let you sneak off without repairs?” The Towers mech asked.

 

“He’ll be busy,” the Polihexian assured. “Tryin’ to workout where he stands in the medbay foodchain, ‘n takin’ care of Prowl. He’ll snarl at me later, nothin’ to worry about.”

 

“It’s your helm,” Mirage replied, noncommittally. The saboteur smirked over his shoulder, and opened the cockpit door.

 

“Good to be home, Ratchet? Prowl?” Jazz asked as he stepped into the cabin, finding the medic and Praxian already on their peds.

 

“More than I expected,” Ratchet admitted.

 

“Yes, it is good to be home,” Prowl agreed. Smiling broadly, the Polihexian smacked the control mechanism, and the loading ramp lowered to the runway. With a servo on Prowl’s back, Jazz walked down the ramp, and onto the tarmac. They really had done it. The relief made the Polihexian’s struts feel like gel.

 

“Ratchet?” It was Optimus who spoke first, surprise more than a little evident in his voice.

 

“Ya, ya,” the medic snorted. “Ya it’s me. Your resident trouble magnet convinced me it was time to come home.”

 

“You went to Polihex, Jazz?” The Prime asked.

 

“We needed a medic,” the saboteur said as nodded first to Prowl, and then to Ratchet. “’N he’s my favourite.”

 

“What was your damage,” Optimus asked, and the medical team inched over. They were looking at the old medic with awe.

 

“Prowl got scrapped savin’ my aft,” Jazz explained. “’N I blew up some slag ‘n didn’t get outta the way so... Not the worst condition me or my ops have come home in.”

 

“No,” the Prime agreed as the paramedical mechanisms nodded in agreement.

 

“You optics were damaged, Prowl?” The Prime queried.

 

“My visual processor requires replacing,” Prowl explained. “Ratchet has resolved the worst of my damage already.”

 

“Thank you for your help on this operation,” Optimus said. “I don’t know if it would have been successful without your part.”

 

“Don’t know if I can call it a success but I don’t think I’d be functionin’ if Prowl hadn’t been there,” Jazz interjected.

 

“More successful than you think, Jazz,” Hound said as he stepped up. “Our mechs are back, and being treated. So you uncovered the Decepticon plot, gave our bots the chance to get home, and came back alive. I’ll call it a success.”

 

“I want reports from both of you, after you’ve been treated,” the Prime declared. “Only after you have been treated.”

 

“Understood,” the Praxian said.

 

“Got it, Boss Bot,” the saboteur agreed.

 

“Any of you got a problem with me escorting my... the patients to the medbay?” Ratchet asked the paramedical bots.

 

“No!” They exclaimed in excited unison.

 

One stepped forward, Jazz did not know his designationa and said: “Medic Hoist is on call. Should I alert him?”

 

“Yah, you should,” the old medic replied. “I’m not going to step on any peds.”

 

“You won’t be, Ratchet,” Optimus assured him. “We always need more medics.”

 

That was not exactly true, Jazz realized, though the Matrix-Bearer may have been too optimistic to see it. Ratchet was famous, and stories of his medical miracles had been shared between medics, nurses, and paramedics so many times over that the cranky old mech almost had a cult following. Even if Hoist was CMO now, sooner or later he would feel he needed to step down in favour of the more experience, and considerably more revered medic. Though there was a chance Hoist really was as easygoing, and good-natured as he had always appeared to be, and he might actually be happy to pass on the command and administrative side to the job in favour of just treating his patients.

 

Though there were stretchers ready to take the newly arrived, and rather battered operatives to the medbay, Jazz looped his arm around Prowl’s back, and guided him towards off the runway. Hound walked on the saboteur’s other side, and though Jazz could not hear him, he was fairly certain Mirage was walking alongside the scout. Ratchet did not vocalize any complaints, and so neither did the paramedics. Instead the old codger walked side by side with Optimus, speaking softly. Jazz’s audial horns were more than sensitive enough to pick up Ratchet’s insistence that he was perfectly alright. If the medic thought you could actually lie to the Matrix-Bearer about something like that, and be believed than he had been out of Iacon for too long.

 

He pretended to be oblivious to the converation behind him, and kept his optics in front of him as he slowly led Prowl through the empty halls. The slow speed was not because he wanted to close the distance between himself and the mechs behind him, rather it was because his legs really were like gel, and he did not think he could lift his peds at any real speed. Optimus’ and Ratchet’s ped steps stopped, but the saboteur walked on as though he was not aware that they had stopped. Je heard the Seekers quietly walking up to the Prime, and then stop. As far back as they were from Jazz and his companions, they felt safe enough to speak without being overheard. They were wrong.

 

“No one’s on board,” Breakaway whispered. “Someone else was piloting. “Didn’t get close enough to see but there was a blue and white mech or femme in the pilot’s seat.”

 

“The pilot is contractor to Commander Jazz,” Optimus revealed, also in a whisper. “He may well have slipped off when we weren’t looking.”

 

“But I was always looking,” Windrazor murmured.

 

Jazz might have felt guilty for the deception, for allowing a mech with Mirage’s abilities to walk into the Prime’s Palace without alerting Red Alert or Optimus himself, but Jazz knew and trusted the spy, and if he wanted to continue to ask his assistance, and more importantly his friendship, he needed to allow Mirage to keep his secrets, to keep himself secret. One of his favourite training exercises was pitting his operatives against Red Alert and the Primal Vanguard. If they were thwarted, and they were often enough, it was more likely to to have been Red catching the operative, than the Vanguard. Up against Mirage, the Primal Vanguards did not have a hope in Pit of catching him, and Red was probably just as helpless to stop the Crystal City spy as any of them.

 

None of Jazz’s own traps had ever triggered when Mirage had turned up, there had to be something, someway, and Hound probably had the best idea but one of the things the scout had insisted on getting in writing when he and Jazz had been working on his contract was that he never be asked to work against his former heres. It was also the one part that he had required Optimus to sign off on as well. Ratchet trotted up, disrupting the Poliheixan’s thoughts, followed by the paramedical team. The Prime did not join him,and Jazz guessed he was talking to the Primal Vanguards, or the Seeker pair. Just as the trio and their invisible tag-along reached the medbay doors, Hoist ran up out of nowhere, and all but tackled Ratchet. Jazz smiled, while Prowl flared is doorwings at the sound of the two mechs crashing together. The jovial cheers from Hoist, countered by the rough sass from Ratchet seemed have clued him in that this was not an attack.

 

“Hoist worked with Ratchet for vorns,” Jazz explained, quietly.

 

“You old rust bucket,” Hoist exclaimed. “I can’t believe Jazz managed to drag your aft back here.”

 

“It was time,” Ratchet replied. “I didn’t want to admit it but it was.”

 

“More than past time,” the deep green and orange mech declared. “You already been taking care of the patients?”

 

“Jazz needs some work, as you can see,” the old white and red medic explained. “Prowl needs a new visual cortex. I’m hoping you’ve got his model in stock.”

 

“If I don’t, Wheeljack can probably put something together,” Hoist replied.

 

“Yah...” Ratchet scoffed, and shook his helm. “I don’t think I want to install one of ‘Jack’s time bombs in his helm.”

 

“He’s not quite as bad as Ratch is paintin’m,” Jazz interjected when he felt Prowl stiffen. “But... a lot of the slag he builds blows up. A lot of my kit comes from his lab.”

 

“Have they ever detonated in your subspace?” Prowl asked.

 

In unison, the medics replied: “Yes!”

 

“I believe I can wait for the appropriate component should there not be one available at this time,” the Praxian said.

 

“Once,” the saboteur exclaimed, chuckling as he did. “One time, ‘n it was a paint bomb, no big deal.”

 

“You didn’t have to clean it out of your internals,” Hoist countered. “I did. It was a mess.”

 

“Why don’t we get these two settle for the dark-cycle and get there repairs scheduled for first light,” Ratchet suggested. “It’s been a Pit of a dark-cycle.”

 

“A good recharge is always ideal before any repair work,” the younger medic agreed, and as he looked pointedly at Ratchet he added: “Especially when it’s the MEDIC getting the recharge.”

 

“You don’t mind me just walking in and treating Bots?” The old mech asked.

 

“It’s always been your medbay, Ratchet,” Hoist replied, as he triggered the door. “I’ve just been watching it for you for a while. You’re the best surgeon to come out of Iacon, maybe even Cybertron. I’m good enough, but I can’t hope to safe some of the mechanisms you can pull back rom the well. No one’s going to begrudge you taking over CMO.”

 

“I don’t know about taking over,” Ratchet said. “But these two are my patients, and I just as well finish what I started.”

 

“Speaking of patients, mine looks like he’s awake,” the green and orange mech observed. Jazz looked across the medbay to a treatment berth occupied by a familiar mech. He recoiled, and Hound put a servo on his shoulder.

 

“He’s okay,” the scout explained. “I’ll explain in a few.”

 

“Origin?” Smokescreen exclaimed as he sat up and saw the newcomers. “Jazz? You’re back!”

 

***

 

“Smokescreen?” Prowl asked, surprise momentarily making him off balance. He flared his blind doorwings, and cocked his helm towards the vague direction he thought his creation at spoken from. Though Jazz was keeping him steady, the Polihexian was equally stiff as alarm flared in his field.

 

“I promise he’s alright,” Hound said. The tactician heard the servus-frame’s ped steps and resisted tensing further as the mech touched his arm. “I’ll take you over... Jazz looks like he’s lost his second wind.”

 

“Third at this point,” Jazz muttered, and he slipped his arm away from Prowl’s back. It was hugely disorienting to not have that familiar arm, and that familiar EM field guiding him, but Hound’s field, solid and steady as the new originator’s frame would be described, was oddly reassuring, and the Praxian allowed himself to be guided over to his creation.

 

“What happened to you, origi... origin?” Smokescreen asked, sounding as alarmed by Prowl’s presence as his originator felt by his. The strength of that alarm delayed the tactician from absorbing the fact that his creation had called him origin, and not originator for the first time in a very long time. “You’re blind?”

 

“My visual cortex was damaged beyond repair,” the Praxian originator explained. “It will be replaced now that we have returned to Iacon. How were you injured, Smokescreen?”

 

“Now that’s a bit of a story,” the servus-frame interjected, and he manoeuvred, Prowl over to a mediberth, somewhere nearby that of Smokescreen. “Jazz, Prowl, both of you sit and Smokey and me will debrief you.”

 

“Be quick,” Ratchet called over from a ways away. “All of you need recharge.”

 

“Who’s he?” The rookie op asked, likely only noticing Ratchet now. “And why is he terrifying?”

 

“Ah, he does that on purpose,” the Polihexian explained, as he sat next to Prowl. “It’s the field. He’s berthside manner is slag half the time, but he’s brilliant. He’ll have your originator up and operational in a ‘cycle or two.”

 

“And you?” Smokescreen asked. “You look like a gestalt used you as a kickball.”

 

“See everyone else says I look like I been flyin’ through an asteroid belt,” Jazz replied, with a note of confusion, Prowl belatedly realized was in jest. “Now I don’t know what to think... They’ll fix me up too, Smokey, no worries. Now, you two, explain.”

 

“Tread Bolt came here looking for you,” Hound explained. Jazz flinched with enough force that Prowl felt it, despite they were sitting on opposite ends of the berth. “They fragged up his reprogramming. He was not stable wasn’t or loyal. He ripped up a bunch of ‘Cons and one of their mnemosurgeons when he escaped. He was hiding in your office when Smokey and than me and Silverbolt came in to work. Smokey tricked him into taking him hostage.”

 

“When I tried to get away, once we were out in the open, he caught me again,” Smokescreen elaborated. “He cut the cables in my ankle before Hound appeared and saved my aft. I need to work on my smokescreen... It stuck to him but he still found me.”

 

“Tread Bolt’s got real good radar,” Jazz revealed. “Ain’t surprised he saw through it. That was brave ‘n crazy, Smokey... Takin’ on an op like him.”

 

“Tread Bolt’s Seeker core programming was intact enough to keep him from attacking me, but his rage would have cut through it eventually,” the new originator explained. “Or he might have decided I was unfit. It could have been so ugly. Smokescreen’s my hero.”

 

“You did well, Smokescreen,” Prowl said, feeling like the glyphs paltry, but he had no others to say. He felt like he could shake, for fear of what his creation had faced, and survived. But he sat still.

 

“So did you, Prowl,” the saboteur stated, taking a deep intake, he squeezed Prowl’s shoulder as he shared a bit of their experience in Rodion. “He got hurt keepin’ Scrounge from throwin’ a Vosian EMP grenade in my faceplates. ‘N then he organized those Rodion rebels to counter the ‘Cons, blind ‘n hurtin’. Took out a fraggin’ canon too. I don’t think we’d be back, least not yet, ‘n without a lotta luck if he hadn’t kept his helm.”

 

“You kept control of the situation,” the Praxian said. The praise, Jazz’s of him, felt in some ways undeserved. He had not kept his helm, not in the end, rather he had been a crippled liability. “You were the operative, I believe who could have survived that assignment.”

 

“Ya might be right,” Jazz said, and Prowl felt the berth shift as the other mech stood. “Hound, they got Tread Bold ‘n Scrounge in CR chambers?”

 

“Yep,” Hound confirmed. “Dealing with the frame damage before they try and sort out the processor damage. Ratchet might be the best news for them.”

 

“Here’s hopin’,” the Polihexian replied, before dropping into a whisper. “’M gonna visit’em. Smokey, Prowl get some rest. Hound, I’ll follow ya soon.”

 

“I imagine Ratchet will not be please to see you disappear,” Prowl observed, keeping his voice low as well.

 

“Not gonna rat me out?” Jazz asked, and it surprised Prowl to realize that the mech was teasing him.

 

“No,” the tactician confirmed. “You are the one who will face his wrath.”

 

In truth, Prowl was grateful when Jazz slipped away, and when Hound left as well. He wanted to speak with Smokescreen. There were many things he wanted to say, but as the Praxian originator sat on the mediberth, he found he could not formulate a pleasing sentence, and as a result, he remained silent. Though the tactician did not dwell in silence for long as he heard Smokescreen’s peds hit the floor, and Prowl leapt up, and reached out blindly, remembering his creation’s leg had been damaged. Smokescreen’s servos wrapped around his extended arms and gingerly, the young mech inched over. When he was close enough, Smokescreen half fell, half lunged into Prowl’s arms, and hugged him with a near crushing grip. The gesture shocked the elder Praxian, and for a moment he was unsteady on his peds. Letting out the vent he did not realize he was holding, Prowl hugged his creation close.

 

“I knew you were alive,” Smokescreen said, face hidden against his originator’s chassis. “I didn’t know if you were okay, if they had you. I just knew you were alive.”

 

“I felt you reach out,” Prowl replied. “I was not in a state to reach back..”

 

“These aren’t working either,” the young mech asked, reaching to touch Prowl’s doorwing.

 

“I have some sensory burn,” the originator explained. He guided Smokescreen to sit, as best he could, and sat immediately next to him, keeping his arms around his creation. “Using doorwings to see is a romantic notion, the reality is considerably more painful. It was exacerbated by the fact that I injured both my right knee, and doorwing at the same time as I was blinded.”

 

“You’ve already had some repairs,” Smokescreen said in a murmur, concerned filled his field.

 

“I became largely incapacitated during our flight from Rodion,” Prowl replied. “Jazz carried me a large part of the way. He took me to Ratchet’s clinic, where the medic performed the repairs he could. My visual cortex is apparently not a standard model, and he had no replacement. My repairs will be finished here.”

 

“Sounds like you’re mad at yourself,” his creation observed. “For being too hurt to continue on your own peds. That stupid, you know. You were hurt, and you pushed yourself, and pushed yourself, and eventually your frame had enough... You expect more of yourself than you could ever measure up to.”

 

“I do not know how to reply to that,” the tactician said.

 

“I know,” Smokescreen replied with a soft, sad chuckle. “You’ve always held yourself to an impossible standard. I thought I had to meet it too.”

 

“I have never wanted you to be me, Smokescreen,” Prowl revealed, guilty for not recognizing the pressure Smokescreen had obviously felt.

 

“What did you want?” The young Praxian asked. “From me? For me?”

 

“Peace, when you were at your most rebellious,” the originator admitted. “But for you? Happiness. At least in my presence, you were so often angry.”

 

Smokescreen took a shaky intake, and repeated the glyph: “Happiness... I wasn’t happy until I was here, ut took me a vorn to figure that out. I thought I was. I pretended I was, but no I wasn’t really happy until I was here.”

 

“Iacon has been good for you,” Prowl said. “You’ve grown in many ways. I am proud of you, and pleased for you.”

 

“Proud of me almost getting myself slagged?” Smokescreen asked.

 

“Proud of you for devoting yourself to a worthy cause,” the elder Praxian explained. “For caring enough to risk yourself to save another. For making yourself a full life. For being a good mech.”

 

“I’m fragging crying because of you,” his creation grumbled. And he pressed his chevron against Prowl’s shoulder, and his tears felt on the originator’s plating.

 

“I am sorry I made you feel unworthy,” Prowl said. “And for suggesting I was not proud of you.”

 

“I didn’t do much to make you proud,” Smokescreen replied, keeping his forehelm against his originator, his digits curled into Prowl’s upper arm.

 

“You loved Bluestreak and included him in your life at an age where most older siblings would want to distance themselves,” the tactician explained. “You were always sneaky. It was maddening when you slipped out behind my back, or outmanoeuvred me. As much as it frustrated me, I had to be proud of your ingenuity.”

 

“Being sneaky’s why Jazz wanted me to enlist,” Smokescreen revealed. “And I am sneaky. And I am defiant. I get into slag, ‘n I don’t grovel when an officer snaps at me. I’m going to disappoint you.”

 

“Blind obedience would not make me prouder of you,” Prowl said. “And in those moment were I do feel disappointed, I will love you nonetheless.”

 

It was, he thought, a promise he finally felt confident enough to make and to keep.

 

End Chapter 25


	26. Chapter 26

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the end folks, thank you for reading. The sequel, currently titled Freefall will begin posting in a few weeks.

Tread Bolt and Scrounge were in CR chambers next to each other. They looked terrible, Scrounge managed even worse than Tread Bold, especially considering his modified arm was missing. It was probably somewhere in Polihex. The arm would be a difficult piece to replicate but Jazz knew Wheeljack would be up for the challenge. He may have already started, or he may have been waiting. The mechs were alive for the moment but being in a CR chamber did not guarantee survival, being in one at all could even suggest that the odds were grim. Jazz forced himself to be optimistic. Ratchet was here, and if any mech could pull a miracle out of his subspace, it was that old grump. Ops had died before, too many had died, it was something the Polihexian had to live with as the commander of Special Operations, but he did not think it was every something he would ever really be able to accept. It disturbed him to know that he had no operatives to send to Polihex, and he could not even return himself without over extending his bots. Mirage could be counted on to share whatever he learned, but that really was not enough. They need more operatives, Autobot operatives, but Jazz knew it would be vorns before Smokescreen or any other rookie was ready for the field, and the problem was, the Autobots did not have the luxury of vorns.

 

“Jazz!” Hoist called as he jogged into the ICU. The saboteur’s optics glowed bright behind his visor when he saw what the medic was holding in his servo. “You partner gave me this.”

 

“I had no idea he kept it,” Jazz said as he stared at Scrounge missing arm.

 

“I think he forgot about it too,” the medic said. “Looks like it came off clean, so reattaching won’t be a problem. We’ll save it for after the worst of his crunching injuries have healed.”

 

“So ya think he’ll live?” The Polihexian asked.

 

“Despite how terrible he looks, his spark is stable,” Hoist revealed. “Same with Tread Bolt. We decided to hold off on the mnemosurgery until after their frames have been repaired. Ratchet wants to try processor surgery anyways, before any mnemosurgeon steps in. He had a good point. Mnemosurgeons cut pieces out, they don’t weld them back together. He thinks he has an idea how to repair some of the damage. Seems like he has a processor he wants to model?”

 

“Prowl suffered some reprogramming as a sparkling,” Jazz explained. “His processor repaired itself pretty fragging well, all on its own.”

 

“Sparkling processor are quite elastic,” the green mech said. “They bounce back from some of the worst trauma with minimal repercussions. Ratchet saw something in his helm that he wants to emulate. He sounds confident.”

 

“Then they probably got a good shot of comin’ outta this closer to themselves than not, the saboteur replied. “Ratch ain’t overly generally over confident, is he?”

 

“No,” Hoist agreed. “If he’s confident, than he has reason to be. Optimus has him distracted. If you want to sneak off, now’s the time.”

 

“Thanks, Hoist,” Jazz said and he turned. “I’ll be back before he gets too antsy.”

 

“Before you run off,” the medic called, and stopped Jazz from running off too fast. He took a jet injector from his subspace. “You’re going to want this.”

 

“Yes,” the Polihexian sighed with gratitude as Hoist ejected the pain blocker into his neck. “You’re a lifesaver, my mech. See ya in a couple of joors.”

 

“No later or Ratchet will come looking for you,” Hoist warned.

 

He would too, Jazz knew that much. The saboteur slipped into the main treatment room of the medbay, nodding to Smokescreen and Prowl, not that the elder Praxian could see, and slipped out the door before Optimus or Ratchet noticed him. His rookie had almost been clinging to his originator, and it was an observation that made Jazz smile. They looked like a family, like procreator and creation, and the Polihexian was happy they had reached out to each other, their estrangement had hurt them both, and Jazz thought it was more than time for them to start rebuilding their relationship. With any luck they would keep it up, but that was up to them. Jazz knew he could not interfere.

 

As planned, Hound and Mirage were waiting for him in his office, engex already poured and waiting for him. Jazz took the cube offered to him, and eased himself into his chair. Frag it was good to be home. Hound looked just about relieved enough to cry, and Mirage just looked concerned. The saboteur grinned at them both and took a long swig of his engex, earned him a hoarse laugh from the Towers mech, and a look of exasperation from the scout. Silverbolt was dead to the world, recharging peacefully against Mirage’s shoulder. It looked like the spy was as comfortable with the newling as Jazz was; the Polihexian had not been certain he would be. Though Hound did have siblings serving the Towers, Jazz did not actually know if Mirage had any family other than Arcee.

 

“What a fraggin’ mess,” Jazz said when he finished his cube.

 

“I tend to agree with your analysis,” Mirage replied. “Shadowplay was not something any of us have been worried about.”

 

“I’ll set up an operation when I got the bots available to do some snooping,” the Polihexian said. “Any luck ‘n that mnemosurgeon Tread Bolt took apart was the last one they had.”

 

“I’ll toast to that,” the spy declared, raising his cube and taking a sip. “Before you arrived, I reported to the Spymaster, as expected I’ve been assigned Polihex.”

 

“When you’re done you really should come here,” Hound replied. Jazz nodded his agreement. “If you’re home, she’ll find a job for you, but if you’re here, you’ll be out of sight, and out of processor.”

 

“I’ll think about it,” Mirage said. “You are the mechs I would most like to spend some down time with.”

 

“Comm from wherever, ‘n I’ll pick ya up,” Jazz offered.

 

“Okay, okay, soon,” the Towers mech relented, smiling with good-naturedly.

 

For a joor or more, the trio relaxed, taking turns holding Silverbolt, and reconnecting. Old friendships like theirs did not require even regular conversation. Even vorns of silence seemed to melt away once they actually sat down and talked. Those concerns that always crept up in Jazz’s processor regarding Mirage’s split allegiance disappeared all together when he sat and talked with him. The only one who needed to be worried about the Towers mech’s priorities was Arcee, because when it came to it, Mirage would take care of his friends before he would take care of the Spymaster or even the Crystal City. She might have avoided that had she cared a bit more for what her creation needed or wanted, instead of using him like a tool, like he owed her some debt. Her highhandedness only benefited Jazz in the end.

 

“The Vanguard are still looking for me,” Mirage said.

 

“Since they ain’t sure if yer a mech or a femme, I think they’ll be stoppin’ anyone they see walking ‘round,” the saboteur replied.

 

“Clearly my framekin do not spend significant time in Iacon,” the Towers mech concluded, looking amused. “It’s good to know they did not get a clear look. You should go back to the medbay and rest, Jazz.”

 

“Ya, I should,” Jazz agreed, with a sigh. To Hound he turned. “You’ll see him off.”

 

“I will,” Hound confirmed. “Stay in the medbay until Ratchet releases you or you are in for no end of grief, Jazz. He’s probably in a worse mood than normal after leaving Rodion.”

 

“He’ll be in a worse one if he ever learns Jazz blew up his clinic,” the Mirage observed. “I’ll comm you, when I can, Jazz.”

 

Ratchet would be fragged off if he learned about the clinic, but Jazz was not about to tell him, and Polihex had muted all media publications from reporting on the city-state vorns ago. The odds were medic would never know, and that was just as well. The walk back to the medbay was slower than the walk to his office. It was not so much that the blocker was wearing off so much as the fact that Jazz really was that tired. Any hopes he had that his brief escape had gone unnoticed was lost when he turned the corner and saw Ratchet waiting in front of the medbay doors. At the larger, and grumpier mech’s scowl, Jazz smiled and shrugged. Though he regretted the shrug immediately, that actually hurt.

 

“As long as you’re mobile you’re a pain in the aft,” Ratchet said. “You partner and his mechling have the good sense to recharge. You had better do the same, Jazz. Or do I need to weld you to the berth?”

 

“Nah, ‘m ‘bout ready for a good ‘charge,” Jazz replied. “You should probably do the same, yah?”

 

“Yah, yah,” the medic huffed. “Optimus is insisting I used the guestroom in his habsuite. I know a losing battle when I see one.”

 

“See ya in the light-cycle, Ratchet,” the Polihexian said.

 

He stepped quietly in the largely unlit medbay. His optics allowed him to walk without worrying about pumping into obstacles; Jazz could see as clearly in the dark as he could in the light. There was a dozen or more mediberths available but the Polihexian made his way to the one on the other side of Prowl’s from Smokescreen’s. It would be a few ‘cycles before the hyper-alertness faded. Jazz knew he would recharge easier knowing that he knew where his mission partner was, and if he came to be in any danger. As quietly as possible, the Polihexian climbed onto his chosen berth, and stretched out. He did not quite creak, though he felt ever movement in a very unpleasant way. Resisting the urge to sigh, Jazz let his helm drop to the berth. There was no reason to hang around Prowl now that they were home, no need to keep close, but the saboteur was tempted, irresistibly so to entangle himself in the Praxian’s life, and as he cycled down to recharge, Jazz knew his motivations were anything but innocent.

 

***

 

“You’re really back!” Bluestreak cheered. Prowl felt his spark flare with love. “Smokey! It’s so good to see you two!”

 

“The mission was successful,” Prowl replied. “As much as it could be. Smokescreen assisted in the end. He saved several mechs’ lives.”

 

“I’m proud of you Smokey!” The youngling declared. “And you, Origin...”

 

“Thanks Blue,” Smokescreen said, quickly stopping Bluestreak from correcting himself. “Origin’s still a bit roughed up so he needs to stick around Iacon a little longer before he springs you from the compound, that okay?”

 

“I’m fine here!” Bluestreak promised. “Don’t hurt yourself trying to make me happy, Origin! I bet you’re thinking about it, aren’t you?”

 

He was too, and Smokescreen had known it, which is why the elder of his creations had outmanoeuvred him. Prowl wanted Bluestreak safely in Iacon, and he considered, very briefly if he ought to just put his creation on a transport, but he dismissed the idea. Barricade could be anywhere, and Prowl could not trust anther to guard his creation as well as he would. Jazz had revealed his suspicion that another Praxian had been at the warehouse during the battle. It really could have been Barricade. The idea still disturbed and even frightened him, but he coped. Ratchet had made it abundantly clear that Prowl could not operate his tactical systems at the level he had been, ideally ever again, but not at least for another quartex. Processor repairs took time to integrate completely, and his had been almost fried. The consequence of keeping the ATS at more normal levels meant that Prowl was feeling his fears more clearly than he cared to. Although the positive could be said to be that he was feeling his love, and his joy just as clearly as his fears, and even though it made him feel vulnerable, it felt good, if a little nauseating. When his repairs had integrated, Prowl would have to seriously consider the pros and cons before he raised the ATS up again for any considerable time.

 

“One orn,” Prowl said. “I have scheduled a transport for this mega-cycle next orn. Cousin Crunch has been alerted. You may return to your school to say your good-byes but you will not need to attend classes unless you wish to.”

 

“Oh thank you!” His younger creation exclaimed. “I’d like that!”

 

“I was thinking of coming with Origin, when he picks you up,” the elder brother revealed. “That okay with you?”

 

Formal language and titles were something Vicomagister had often nitpicked Bluestreak on, though Prowl had tried to encourage his youngest creation to speak how he chose. Certainly sensing that Windbreaker would take any ire out on Prowl, Bluestreak had become increasingly formal in the last stellar-cycle. Hearing his brother call their originator by the informal title had been all the encouragement Bluestreak had needed to fall back into his preferred language. Prowl found he preferred it too. Originator felt cold and remote, Origin felt considerably warmer, and familiar. He had missed being called origin by Bluestreak, and he should have addressed it himself earlier.

 

“Yes!” Bluestreak cheered as he literally leapt with joy. Prowl looked to his creation, sitting beside him. He forced his field open and let approval fill it. As it touched Smokescreen’s his doorwings rose up, and he smiled.

 

“We’ll see you in an orn!” Smokescreen promised. “I hear you have some trophies to show off.”

 

“Yep,” the youngling grinned with cheek. “See you soon.”

 

When the communicator went dark, Prowl sat back and looked at Smokescreen. He had not been back to Praxus since he had entered his self-imposed exile. It must have been a difficult choice, perhaps an impulsive one, to return to see his brother off to their new home. Praxus had never been the right home for the elder of his creations, even it was the city-state where their frametype originated. The hierarchy, the protocols, and the rigidness of both had smothered him. His and Prowl’s unhealthy relationship had not been Smokescreen’s only motivation for leaving their city-state in favour or Iacon, though it may have been the strongest of his motivations, the originator did not actually know.

 

“I will keep the vicomagister from causing you grief,” Prowl promised.

 

“He was always been worse to you,” Smokescreen said. “Any hate he has for me is just because I’m yours. You’re really breaking his hold.”

 

“I fear him, Smokescreen,” the originator explained, very uncertain of sharing even this with his creation. “He has had more power over me than I think you understand.”

 

“Will you tell me?” His creation asked, cocking his helm at Prowl. “I want to understand.”

 

“My procreators had a mnemosurgeon reprogram me when I was a sparkling,” Prowl explained, optics caste down. “It was not the scandal of my glitch that had them leave me at the compound, but the one that resulted from that procedure becoming known. They left my care to Windbreaker, and never communicated with me in any way again. When I glitched publicly, and House Divitae withdrew from a bonding contract with one of his descendents, I was committed to the Institute. I remained there for a very long time. At any point in my life after, if my glitch appeared unstable, for any reason, Windbreaker made known he did not need much provocation to see me committed again, and properly reprogrammed that this time.”

 

“Holy Primus,” Smokescreen cursed. “That’s why you got the ATS installed. I kept making you crash! You... I... it’s my fault!”

 

“Smokescreen, it is not your fault,” the tactician insisted. He cupped his creation’s face in his servos. “My glitch was so out of control after you emerged, anything might have triggered a glitch. I protected myself at your expense. I am sorry.”

 

“No, no, no,” the young Praxian said as he scrunched up his faceplates. “Why did you have me at all? Why did you keep me at all when all I did was hurt you?”

 

“I feared the Vicomagister,” Prowl replied. “I did not believe I could keep my post without his influence so I did as he ordered. I kept you, because it was my duty to you, and in the end, when I could feel it without glitching, because I loved you.”

 

“I thought you hated me,” Smokescreen laughed. “For so long. I knew you resented me. I thought you loved Bluestreak, but never me.”

 

“I did resent you,” the originator admitted. “I did not want to create, that was hardly your fault, it was entirely mine. I loathed Barricade, and I resented how much easier it was for him to engage with you. In the end I made the mistake on focusing more on trying to protect you from him, than connecting with you. But I loved you, Smokescreen, I did not show it as I should have, but I did, and I do.”

 

“I resented you too,” his creation replied. “When I knew you were right about Barricade, especially when you carried Blue. I could have made it easier.”

 

“Making my life easy, was never your responsibility,” Prowl said.

 

“You taught me to shoot,” Smokescreen said. “You taught me about crystals, you played strategy games with me. You didn’t just lock me in a dark closet... You _did_ let me down, but frag, at least now I understand a little. And... you did make more of an effort than I’ve ever wanted to give you credit for. More than I really let you. I wish you’d told me more earlier, but I probably would’ve thrown it back in your face.”

 

“I doubt it,” the tactician replied. “You’ve never been intentionally cruel.”

 

“You really do think more of me that I do, sometimes,” the younger Praxian said. “I’m glad you’re my origin.”

 

The conversation had been difficult, it had hurt but Prowl was grateful that Smokescreen had incited it. Prowl’s shame in his institutionalization had kept him from speaking of it earlier, that was his only regret. Smokescreen had been as accepting of it as his originator had always known he would be. Prowl was proud of him, and grateful to him, for the strength and the warmth of Smokescreen’s spark. He had benefited from it this mega-cycle. Smokescreen could not have realized it, but his reaction to Prowl’s admission had comforted his originator, and given him a little more peace, and the Praxian needed that peace if he was going to adjust to living with his emotions considerably less hampered by his tactical systems.

 

The chime of his habsuite rang, and Prowl stood from his couch to see who had come to visit him. Smokescreen had gone to see a friend, now that he had been freed to put weight on his ped, though he had been warned about doing anything crazy. Prowl felt no lingering discomfort, but he did feel some lingering instability. Though he could see, the sensor burn had been slower to resolve than his vision, and as a result his doorwings had barely any sensation, and the Praxian had to consciously manipulate him to keep from falling off balance. So he walked slowly, methodically to the door. Curious to know who had bothered to come to his habsuite, Prowl palmed the door. It slid open silently, revealing Jazz.

 

“I heard you got sprung from the medbay,” the Polihexian said. Prowl stepped back and gestured for him to come in. Of all the mechs who may have come by, Jazz was just about the only one Prowl would claim to really have wanted to see.

 

“Some of my repairs need to integrate further, but I am mobile, which is a relief,” Prowl replied. “You appear to be in good repair. I understand you actually cracked a strut in your back. You put yourself through considerable pain to get me to Polihex.”

 

“I honestly didn’t feel it ‘till we got there,” Jazz revealed. “Part of my survival programming. Smokescreen loose too?”

 

“He has been allowed to walk and to transform, at last, or so he says,” the Praxian said. “He’s gone to see a friend. Though he is dancing around the subject, I believe he wishes to live here rather than on base, at least during the school semester.”

 

“You good with that?” The saboteur asked.

 

“I am,” Prowl admitted. “It is traditional for Praxian households to remain together, until adult creations bond and create families of their own. Smokescreen is hesitant, I believe, and justifiably so, given to our history. He wishes to come with me to collect Bluestreak. It will be the first time he has returned to Praxus since he relocated to Iacon.”

 

“’M glad for both of you,” Jazz said. “I think it’s a weight off both of you. When’re you collectin’ the bitlet?”

 

“Next orn,” the tactician replied. “Ratchet will not clear me for travel until my sensor burn has fully resolved.”

 

“They still hurtin’ you?” The Polihexian asked, voice soft, and looking concerned. Prowl felt his faceplates heat, and he almost scowled in response.

 

“Not at their current degree of sensitivity,” Prowl revealed. “Ratchet’s medic lock remains in place.”

 

“’M sorry they’re still givin’ ya grief,” Jazz said. “Thank you, for all you did. I got no doubt you saved my life.”

 

“You are welcome,” the Praxian replied. “It was self-serving, Jazz. I would have died with you.”

 

“Maybe,” the saboteur conceded. “I came here, ‘cause I wanted to see how you were doin’. Fact is we went through slag together, ‘n... you’ve been on my processor.”

 

Understanding bloomed in Prowl’s processor as he teeked the Polihexian’s field. Jazz was attracted to him, just as he was to Jazz. As insane, and reckless as it would be to act on it, or to allow the Polihexian to, Prowl wanted. He wanted more than he had wanted any mech at any time. It was reckless to act on it, but he wanted, and Prowl could find not serious argument against what he wished to do. If his ATS had been at full power it would have found some remote but powerful reason, but as it was Prowl made no ever to find an excuse or a reason to resist his desires. Still, his helm spun, and he walked to his kitchen, flicking his doorwing, asking Jazz to follow. Remaining silent, Prowl poured to cubes, not engex of a high quality mid-grade, and he passed one to Jazz. The Polihexian was quiet too, no doubt waiting for Prowl to dismiss him, or something. That would have been the appropriate thing to do, the wise thing, but in this instant he did not want to be wise.

 

“I am attracted to you as well,” he said, at last. Jazz’s visor glowed, and his face lit up with a smile

 

“Thank Primus,” Jazz replied. “Don’t mean I gotta expect anythin’ of you.”

 

“I know,” Prowl said, as he shrugged his doorwings and drank from his cube, He let his field drift out from his frame. “You would not make demands. You have integrity. I do not wish to make demands either. But if you are amenable...”

 

Jazz put down his cube, and closed the gap between them. As he moved in close, Prowl put down his cube and leaned against the counter at his back. Desire flared in his field, and he heard the Polihexian’s engine rev in response. The other mech’s servos were on his hips a nanoklik later, and as Jazz leaned forward, Prowl did as well. It was no tentative kiss but hot and hard. The tactician reached up to hold his partner’s shoulder, and let himself get lost in the taste of Jazz. It was reckless, even careless, but Prowl did not care. He let his servos wander, and soon the saboteur’s were moving too. Touching him, stroking his headlights. Prowl gasped, as he arched into the caress. Recklessness, or madness, whatever it may have been, the Praxian opened his arms, and welcomed it.

 

***

 

Though he was disappointed that his originator would not be coming to get him right away, Bluestreak was happy enough knowing his origin had returned from his mission safe, if in need of repairs. Smokescreen had been with him too, and that may have been the most exciting thing. They had looked comfortable with each other, though that could have been Bluestreak’s imagination. Still, the idea that his family could really becoming whole again, well it was too exciting a prospect to dismiss. Given the joor, he should have been in his berth already but, the youngling could not sit still, let alone lay down. Instead he bounced around his berthroom, grabbing this and that to back into his boxes. A few things, Bluestreak dropped carefully into his subspace, the holo-imager with all of the image captures of his family, the soft, plush cybercat he had owned all his life, and his most recent trophy.

 

On his originator’s behalf, Cousin Crunch had already submitted the paperwork necessary pull Bluestreak from his school here in Praxus. He would miss his friends, but the prospect of the grand adventure of moving to a new city-state, far away from the Ordo compound, was enough to banish any anxieties the youngling might have had. The next orn was going to be torture but just like his origin’s medic, Bluestreak wanted his origin to heal, not re-damage himself for Bluestreak’s sake. So he would wait the orn without complaint. It was a little frightening to think that his origin had been hurt, but he could not have been hurt too badly, he had seemed in decent repair when he and Smokescreen had commed, and so Bluestreak put it out of his processor. Finally feeling just a little tired, the youngling flopped down on his berth, arms outstretched, and vented a little puff. Really, with all this excitement, how was he expected to recharge?

 

“Are you awake, Bluestreak?” Cousin Crunch asked from the doorway.

 

“Sure, Sir,” he said. “Has something happened with my origin...ator?”

 

“Not that I am aware of,” the elder Praxian replied. “The Vicomagister has summoned the entire family to his ziggurat.”

 

“I wonder why,” Bluestrak wondered out loud as he swung his legs off his berth.

 

“At this joor, the sky had best been falling,” Crunch grumbled.

 

The did not appear to be falling. It was dark, and quiet, almost eeriely so. Had it been his origin, or Smokescreen with him, Bluestreak would have been clinging to either of their sides. But it was not his origin, or his brother. Cousin Crunch was not close kin. They, his origin, his brother and he, had no close kin. They descended not from Windbreaker, but from one of his half-brothers, a mech that Windbreaker had never respected. Bluestreak’s ancestor had shared a progenitor with Windbreaker, not an originator, and as such he should never have been considered a part of the Ordo family. But the vicomagister of Ordo then had not wanted to lose access Windbreaker’s progenitor’s wealth and influence when the mech took a new Conjunx Endura after his first mate’s death. So Ordo adopted his new Conjunx Endura, a mech from a considerably lower caste, and so the descendants of that bond were members of Ordo by wrot, but never in Windbreaker’s optics. The current vicomagister had looked down on his half-siblings, and all of their descendants. Had Bluestreak’s origin not had a glitch, Windbreaker still would have despised him, but because he did have that glitch, it gave the old mech what he saw as evidence of the flawed code that came from his low class step-originator, instead of the sad fluke of forging that it was.

 

Cousin Crunch was the most reasonable of the Vicomagister’s descendants, which was the reason Bluestreak’s orgin had named him the youngling’s guardian. But he was not someone to whom his origin had shared more than a few glyphs over the course of their lives, though they were not so far apart in age. Bluestreak was unsure how far he could trust the mech, and as they walked in the dark, he felt very uncertain. He should have commed his origin before he had left, Bluestreak realized, but it was too late now, he had left his workstation in his berthroom. His plating clattered, though he tried to take deep intakes, and calm his wildly pulsing spark.

 

“I’m sure its fine, Bluestreak,” Crunch said. “The Vicomagister is known for his dramatics, after all.”

 

Nodding silently, the youngling and followed his guardian into the ziggurat that towered above all others within the compound. It was also quiet, which only made Bluestreak more nervous. Crunch seemed annoyed, and not at all nervous, and so the young Praxian tried to emulate his elder, with little success. Finally, the entered the massive room that served as the ziggurat’s ballroom. In the far corner, various members of the Ordo family were clustered together. Grumbling under his ventilations, Crunch led Bluestreak over to the crowd. The youngling knew all these mechs by designation, though he actually knew nothing about them. Some had creations, ones barred from associating with Bluestreak, for fear of angering the Vicomagister. Though all of the family was supposed to be gathering here, Bluestreak realized he was the only youngling there.

 

“What’s going on?” Crunch demanded. “Why have we been called here? Where are your creations, Streetstar?”

 

“Only _his_ presence is need,” Windbreaker called from his chair. Crunch straightened, sharply and his doorwings shot up. Bluestreak cowered behind him. From the shadows, mechs stepped forward, not Praxians, but Seekers. Suddenly, the youngling realized, he was not the only one here who was afraid.

 

Crunch stared at the Vicomagister, servos curled into fists as the Seekers stepped in. He snarled: “Grand-originator, what have you done now?”

 

***

 

Barricade strolled into the tall ziggurat, passed the Seekers standing guard. Every member of the House was safely trapped inside, or so the Seekers’ had said. Every other ziggurat in the compound had been empty, something the Praxian Decepticon had confirmed himself, so there was no reason to believe otherwise. All of the Ordo members would be conveniently crowded together, and Barricade grinned with vicious anticipation as he approached the grand ballroom where the noble family was being held, and where he would never have been admitted. Finally, he had won, there could be no escape for the clever tactician now. Nodding to the Seeker guarding this door, Barricade strutted inside. A look of disgust distorted Windbreaker’s faceplates, and the grin on Barricade’s faceplates only broadened. The Vicomagister had thought he could string Barricade along with a few measly credits, now he would see what the cost of doing business with the Praxian kingpin really was. The Decepticon turned, ready to claim his prize. The grin on Barricade’s faceplates faded as he looked over the frightened Ordo members. Prowl was not among them.

 

“Where is Prowl?” He demanded through clenched denta. Windbreaker’s lipplates curled.

 

“Iacon,” the older Praxian said. Barricade recoiled. No! The court date had been scheduled, Prowl could not miss it, would not dare to miss it.

 

“What the frag are you talking about?” Barricade snarled. “You told me the court date was next ‘cycle.”

 

“And orns ago, it was,” Windbreaker replied with a snort of derision. “It was cancelled. The Justices ruled you had no case.”

 

“Useless sack of scrap,” the Decepticon roared, the assembled Praxians shivered or cringed with fear. “Where’s the scraplet?”

 

No one spoke, and Barricade pointed a blaster at their helms. He waved it back and forth, and finally, somemech pushed the grey and white youngling into the open. Bluestreak’s plating clattered as his progenitor stared him down. The wimpy thing was hardly worth his time, but Barricade needed bait if he was going to lure Prowl out in the open, and for that this youngling was perfect. As the Decepticon stepped towards the youngling, one of Prowl’s cousins, an orange and black mech stepped between Barricade and his prey. Resolutely, the noble Praxian stared the former crime boss down. With a sneer, Barricade lifted his blaster and aimed it at the mech.

 

“Outta my way,” he ordered.

 

“Prowl made it clear you are not permitted near Bluestreak,” the orange Praxian said. Barricade shook his helm and laughed.

 

“Do you think I care what Prowl wants,” Barricade asked, still laughing. “I held him down and ‘faced that little bastard into him, you think he wanted that?”

 

“Get out of the way, Crunch,” Windbreaker ordered as his family looked on at him in horror. They might not have felt much of anything for their glitched cousin, but the idea that their vicomagister, their originator, grand-originator, etc had order Prowl into the berth of this mech was not siting well with any of them.

 

“No,” Crunch replied, turning to glare over his shoulder at his grand-originator. “You dealt with this criminal to keep Lancet’s deviancy from becoming public knowledge. Now look where it’s brought us. Was it worth it, grand-originator? Was my brother’s reputation worth this?”

 

“You get out of the way or you’re a dead mech,” the Decepticon ordered. Crunch stood straight, doorwings flared wide. With a snort of contempt, Barricade fired. For a moment the room was silent , but as the body dropped to the ground, the youngling screamed.

 

End Fic.


End file.
